AIDS: Information You Need To Know

As sad as it is to hear, the rate of those who are infected with AIDS is growing every year. Unless we as a population start taking more safety precautions against this horrible illness, we're going to continue to see it growing at an even faster rate.

The following are some of the main findings in relation to the current statistics of AIDS.

HIV Prevalence Estimate

The HIV prevalence estimate refers to how many people are living with HIV at the end of each given year. At the end of 2006, there was an estimated 1,106,400 people living with AIDS in the United States. Of these, 21% of those were undiagnosed and unaware that they were suffering from the condition.

In addition to this, statistics indicate that 56,300 new people were infected with HIV during 2006, which is the most recent year available to date. Over half of these people were gay or bisexual men, and it was also indicated that African American men and women also showed an incidence rate of seven times that of white people.

AIDS Cases By Age

Age also plays a factor regarding the number of people who have been infected by AIDS so it's important to look at. Some might assume that it is the younger population, those in their early to late twenties who show the greatest predominance of infection due to the increased sexual partners this age range experiences.

This however, is not the case. As statistics indicate the highest incidence of AIDS grouped by age range is in those who are between the ages of 40-44, which saw 6,813 new cases in 2007.

This compares to the 20-24 age range which saw 1,927 new cases develop, the age range of 25-29, which saw 3,380 new cases develop, the age range of 30-34, which had 4,187 new cases, and then the age range of 35-39, which had 5,888 new cases.

This could also partly be swayed by the fact that those who do get infected with AIDS at the younger ages (in their mid to late twenties) don't become fully aware of it until they are in their thirties. These people would then show up in the older age for reporting purposes.

AIDS Cases By Race

As mentioned above, race also factors in to the overall prevalence of AIDS cases, with Black and African American individuals showing the greatest incidence at 17,505 cases in 2007. Second highest according to race is the white population, in which there were 10,407 identified cases.

Third were Hispanic and Latinos people with 6,921 cases, and then American Indian/Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian individuals ranking the lowest with under 200 cases each.

Remember that the more populated a particular race is the greater chance there is for incidence so that too will come into play, but this still does show an overall trend of which people are most at risk.

AIDS Cases By Transmission Category

Since AIDS can be transmitted more easily by certain methods than others, you should also factor this into your overall perception of the statistics on AIDS.

The highest incident rate of AIDS occurred with male-to-male sexual contact, which had over four times as many incidences as any other variety at 16,749 cases in 2007.

Second on the list was heterosexual contact with high risk individuals, which is defined as someone who is known to have an HIV infection, at 4,011 cases.

Next on the list was transmission by injection drug use, and then all other cases were identified as other (which includes haemophilia, blood transfusion, and perinatal exposure).

AIDS is a very real and deadly problem facing our society today and unless we stay on top of the various protective measures that one can take, there is a good chance that it's only going to get worse from here on out.

Reference: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/basic.htm


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Vianesa Vargas of Take Care Project Inc brings wellness products to help busy moms to be their very best. Find informative exercise/nutrition tips and articles on a wide range of topics for mom on Vianesa's Transforming the Balanced Mom Blog and http://www.takecareproject.com. Drop by Facebook to see the weekly Q&A call schedule. Don't forget to sign up for the Take Care newsletter - filled with information moms won't see anywhere else.