AIDS- It's Not Just For Breakfast Anymore

The following facts and statistics from the international AIDS charity AVERT.


In 1981, the United States of America became the first country to identify AIDS as a distinct condition. Since then many thousands have become infected, and by the end of 2005, more than half a million people had died of AIDS in America – the equivalent of the entire population of Las Vegas. There are currently more than one million people living with HIV in America and around a quarter of those are unaware of their infection, which presents a high risk of onward transmission for future partners.

Yet the USA has no formal AIDS strategy, and thousands of uninsured Americans struggle to access good HIV care and antiretroviral therapy. The world’s biggest donor of AIDS-related funding is itself facing a major, ongoing AIDS epidemic, and the situation grows worse each year.

There are also variations in the geographical distribution of AIDS cases across the USA. Once an epidemic that was concentrated mainly in the gay populations on the East and West coasts, AIDS has also now taken hold within Black and Latino communities in many Southern states. The map on the right shows how AIDS cases were distributed across the US in 2005.

New AIDS cases across the US, 2005 (brown = highest concentration, light yellow = lowest)








The USA has no national prevention strategy or prevention targets. Prevention initiatives that actively work to prevent people becoming infected tend to be carried out on a state- or city-wide level, either by local authorities, or by HIV support organizations. Such prevention initiatives may concentrate on particular communities or groups of people, or they may be more general in their focus. Independent organizations play a particularly big role in preventing HIV among injecting drug users, as it is illegal for federal money (and occasionally state or city money) to be used for needle exchange programs.

One area where prevention efforts have successful in the US is the prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT). Routine HIV testing for pregnant women in many states, and good treatment and care, means that diagnoses of HIV in babies have dropped dramatically since HIV was first discovered in the US.

In other areas, prevention efforts have had less of an effect however, and while combination antiretroviral treatment has helped to dramatically reduce the number of people developing and dying of AIDS in America, overall, around 40,000 continue to be diagnosed with AIDS every year. This suggests that HIV infection levels are not declining.

In September 2007, over 100 AIDS organizations joined together to call for the introduction of a National AIDS Strategy that would set out a clear national prevention plan and bring an end to the 40,000 new infections that occur each year. The campaign targets the candidates for the 2008 presidential election.

“The wealthiest nation in the world is failing its own people in responding to the AIDS epidemic at home. Our country must develop what it asks of other nations it supports in combating AIDS: a comprehensive national strategy to achieve improved and more equitable results."- Rebecca Haag, Executive Director of AIDS Action.