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AIDS In The New Millennium
WASHINGTON (IslamOnline) - More than 36 million people worldwide will be infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, by the end of 2000, including an estimated 5.3 million new cases, says the World Health Organization (WHO).
Last year, 2.6 million people died of AIDS worldwide.
The disease’s largest impact will be in Africa, according to figures released by the U.N. health agency. Globally, it estimates 3 million people will die from AIDS in 2000, 80% of them in Africa.
"Although only about one-tenth of the world population lives there, sub-Saharan Africa remains the hardest-hit region, accounting for 72% of the people infected with HIV during 2000," said a report in WHO's Epidemiological Record.
WHO estimates there are 5.8 million people living with HIV or AIDS in South and Southeast Asia, with a reported 1.4 million in Latin America.
The largest percentage increase, however, is in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, where 250,000 new infections are estimated this year, taking the total for the region to 700,000.
The scope of the spread of the virus and disease differ within Muslim countries.
According to the President of the Pan-African Organization for the fight against AIDS (OPALS-Morocco), Nadia Bezad, a Moroccan native, Morocco has been witnessing an annual increase in percentage of those carrying the virus.
On Saturday, he said 68% of patients infected by AIDS contracted the virus through sexual intercourse, and that 70% of those infected are between 15-39 years of age.
He said the rate of contamination among women is about 34%, and was also increasing constantly, adding that infection with other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in the country, recorded about 600,000 new cases per year.
Other countries like Iran are considered having one of the lowest percentages among Islamic nations.
On Sunday, the Secretary of the National Committee to Combat AIDS In Iran, Bahram Yeganeh announced the country’s latest figures saying that 2,207 people have been inflicted by HIV since 1987.
He added that 1,424 of those infested contacted the disease by injecting drugs.
He said 65% of the epidemic transfer in Iran is through injection, especially among drug users, 12% through sexual contact, nine percent blood transfusion, one percent mother-to-child transmission and 13 percent in “unknown” ways.
AIDS reporting from Muslim countries has not always been reliable given the social stigma attached with the disease. In many Muslim countries, doctors and governments fail to either correctly report AIDS cases, or label the disease as something else.
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