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AIDS Epidemic Facts

The human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or AIDS. HIV attacks the immune system and limits the body's ability to fight off infection. There is no cure for AIDS.

  1. History

    • According to AVERT, the available data suggests that the AIDS pandemic began in Africa in the 1970s. It rapidly spread around the world, affecting North and South America, Europe and Australia by 1980. Approximately 100,000 to 300,000 people may have contracted the disease during this time period. The first cases were reported in the United States in June of 1981.

    Significance

    • More than 550,000 people in the United States have died of AIDS since the beginning of the epidemic, according to the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, and 1.2 million Americans are living with HIV/AIDS as of 2007. In 2008, 33.4 million people around the world were living with HIV/AIDS, and two million people lost their battle with the disease that same year.

    Effects

    • The spread of AIDS peaked in 1996, when approximately 3.5 million people were infected with the disease. Since then the infection levels have stabilized. The level of new HIV infections has dropped by 30 percent since the disease peaked. Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 71 percent of all new infections as of 2008, according to UNAIDS.

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