Falling numbers of HIV and AIDS infections worldwide
Sunday is World Aids Day. The life-threatening immunodeficiency disease has spread worldwide since the early 1980s and killed millions of people, particularly in Africa. Recently, the number of infections and deaths has fallen worldwide.
01.12.2024, 05:30
SDA
Experts see this as great progress, but AIDS is still far from being eradicated. According to the UN AIDS program Unaids, around 1.3 million people were infected with HIV last year. This means that the number of new infections reached a historic low. 630,000 people died in 2023 from diseases that occur in the late stages of AIDS. This was also the lowest figure since the peak of 2.1 million deaths in 2004.
The decline is mainly due to an improvement in the situation in South African countries, which are by far the hardest hit by the AIDS epidemic.
However, the number of infections has not fallen in all regions of the world: in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, the number of new HIV infections has actually increased recently. Experts warn that the global community is therefore still a long way from achieving the UN's goal of eliminating HIV and AIDS as a health threat by 2030.
The world has made "remarkable global progress" in reducing new HIV infections, explained lead study author Hmwe Kyu from the US Institute for Health Statistics IHME. But: "More than one million people are still newly infected with HIV every year; and a quarter of the 40 million people living with HIV are not receiving treatment."
Effective treatment methods
Access to medication which, when taken regularly, suppresses the multiplication of HIV in the body and prevents an outbreak of AIDS has improved overall. So-called antiretroviral drugs reduce the amount of virus in the blood to an undetectable level. A viral load below the detection limit also protects against the transmission of HIV: it prevents infection during sex, for example, but also prevents transmission from pregnant women to their unborn children and from breastfeeding mothers to their babies.
Pre-exposure prophylaxis (Prep) has also proven to be an effective tool in the fight against HIV and AIDS. This medication is mainly used by gay men to protect themselves from HIV infection during sex. This method of protection has helped to reduce the number of infections in many countries.
New drug as a beacon of hope
For poorer countries, however, providing HIV-infected people with medication is still a challenge due to the high costs. This is also reflected in the discussions about the new drug Lenacapavir: according to clinical studies, the drug from the US pharmaceutical company Gilead provides 100 percent protection against HIV infection and only needs to be injected twice a year. Previous HIV drugs in tablet form have to be taken daily.
At 40,000 dollars (around 35,000 Swiss francs) per person per year, lenacapavir has so far been very expensive. However, experts estimate the production costs at just 40 dollars.
In October, Gilead announced the conclusion of licensing agreements with six generic manufacturers, who are now to produce and distribute the drug in low-income countries. However, critics point out that millions of people infected with HIV live in countries where such a cheaper version of lenacapavir will not be available for the time being.
Despite decades of effort, there is still no vaccination against HIV. This will remain the case for the foreseeable future. Experts are therefore pressing all the more resolutely for widespread use of lenacapavir. The injection is "basically" as effective as a vaccination, says researcher Andrew Hill from the University of Liverpool.
