Rome (Fides Service) – Usually people in cities and tourist areas are more affected by HIV/AIDS than people in rural areas. Movement of people, closeness to paths of communications spreads HIV/AIDS. Infection among sex workers is 80% in Nairobi, 55% in Cuba and 33% in Europe.
Northern European countries are more open than Italy but from Australia to Scotland from Portugal to Estonia and overseas the common objective is to unite efforts to fight HIV/AIDS.
The situation of HIV/AIDS is changing thanks to therapy available and progress in research.
The production of new antiretroviral drugs and virus-resistant drugs gives new hope in the battle against AIDS and have led to decrease in the evolution of AIDS in patients who have been given therapy; decrease in the morality rate (about 30% less); testing with new drugs has improved the overall health conditions of patients. Of course these results may not be lasting but it is also true that research is producing more drugs which can be used as a substitute to stop the lethal effect of the virus.
In Italy since 1982, when the first case of AIDS was reported, to 30 giugno 2003, there have been about 51,968 registered cases. Of these 40,411 (77,8%) were men 725 (1.4%) were children under 13 anni, and 3,056 (5.9%) were non-Italians. The average age of people infected is 34 for men 32 for women. The number of people killed by AIDS up to 2003 was 33,564 that is 64.6% of the registered cases. However since it is not compulsory to report deaths for AIDS the number is probably higher. In the first six months of 2003 the number of new cases of AIDS reported was 848. (AP/AM) (3/4/2004 Agenzia Fides)