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Apr 24, 2018
Tuesday
10:22:05
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Sponsored by:
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Innovative BiomedicaLAB
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Overview: AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa
Visit latest
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AIDS Epidemic Update in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
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AIDS Database (by Country or Region)
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AIDS News & Information Archive: Africa
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AIDS Topics & Resources
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General Databases and Resources
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Visit Geographic AIDS Database to access other countries/regions.
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The topics and resources included in this section are specific for the country or region. Visit the
"Major Topics" section, A-Z navigation links above or use the Search link, to find specific topics on HIV/AIDS.
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Worldwide
&
Sub-Saharan African countries most affected by HIV/AIDS
AIDS Maps of Africa:
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Overview:
HIV-1
&
HIV-2;
High-Risk
&
Low-Risk Populations
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East,
West,
Central,
Southern and
Northern Africa
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AIDS
ravages
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Sub-Saharan Africa
. By the end of the year 2001, more than 28 million (about 70%) of the 40 million people worldwide with
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HIV/AIDS
, now live in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
, devastating almost every country in the region. [View latest report of the
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AIDS Epidemic Update in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
.]
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The map (to the right) provides animated snapshots of the spread of the
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AIDS
epidemic in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
from 1984-1999. [View also the worldwide
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AIDS
map shown below.] The data gathered by UNAIDS indicated that "AIDS-like illnesses" were diagnosed in the early 1980's in some countries in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
, especially in
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Uganda
,
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R Congo
and
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Tanzania
. The epidemic soon spread rapidly to the contiguous countries in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
.
During the same period, many of the countries in
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Africa
were embroiled from one civil strife to another -- involving warring factions within a country or among adjacent countries. Read the database of country profile links, collated here (see countries in
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Africa
). These civil strifes caused forced mobilization, concentration of people in refugee camps, rape, forced prostitution and/or servitude, etc. that contributed to the wildfire spread of
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HIV
infection.
Today, 25 of the top 28 countries (worldwide) with the highest rate of
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HIV
infections (exceeding 4% of adult population) are in
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Africa
; 19 of these have HIV infection rates exceeding 8% of the adult population. Twenty one (21) countries in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
have a population of people living with
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HIV/AIDS
(PLWHA) exceeding 100,000. Only a few other countries in other regions of the world have a population of PLWHA comparable to those in Sub-Saharan Africa. [Read brief discussion in the latter link and the companion link, countries (worldwide) most affected by
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HIV/AIDS
.]
The infection rates are higher among those in the 15-49 age range, and even much higher among the "high-risk" groups, i.e., sex workers and their clients, injecting drug users (IDUs), etc. Because of the extent of the epidemic, even those classified as "low-risk", i.e., pregnant women, blood donors and those without defined risky activities, showed high rates of
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HIV
infection in some countries.
The vast majority of those afflicted with
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AIDS
are in the 24-49 age range; many are parents who are the main source of financial support of their families. Death of parents from
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AIDS
have orphaned more than 12 million children in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
. [Examine statistics in Sub-Saharan African countries and countries (worldwide) most affected by
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HIV/AIDS
.]
In the most heavily affected areas in many countries in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
, the average life expectancy has fallen to as low as 30 years. The
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AIDS
epidemic has devastating socio-political and economic consequences, erasing many of the hard-earned development gains of the past generation and now threatens to undermine the future of
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Sub-Saharan Africa
.
While the rate of infection is very high all over
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Sub-Saharan Africa
, the epidemic is even more devastating in Southern Africa. About 300,000 (19%) of the 1.6 million population of
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Botswana
are estimated to be living with AIDS, the worst (%) in Southern Africa and countries worldwide.
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South Africa
alone is estimated to have about 4.7 million cases of HIV/AIDS; with more than 500,000 added since the previous estimate by the end of 1999.
The various "AIDS Maps of
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Africa
" (view map links included below) provide more detailed pictographic representations of the extent of
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HIV
infection, for both HIV-1
and
HIV-2, in "High-Risk"
and
"Low-Risk" (read footnote for definitions) populations in various countries and regions in
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Africa
.
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Worldwide
&
Sub-Saharan African countries most affected by HIV/AIDS
AIDS Maps of Africa:
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Overview:
HIV-1
&
HIV-2;
High-Risk
&
Low-Risk Populations
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East,
West,
Central,
Southern and
Northern Africa
HIV-1, the
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HIV
strain more prevalent in other parts of the world, including Western countries, is prevalent also in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
(view map links above). However, unlike other regions of the world, some countries in Sub-Saharan
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Africa
also have high rate of infection with a related virus strain, HIV-2, localized mainly in Western Africa (view map links above). Infections with the HIV-2 strain are more rare in other parts of the world, and have been traced ultimately to come from sources in
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Africa
.
The prevalence of the HIV-2 strain in
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Africa
, as well as other human and animal
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HIV
related to the HIV-1 strain plus the early "beachhead" of the
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AIDS
epidemic in some countries in
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Sub-Saharan Africa
suggest strongly that the human strain of
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HIV
may have its origins from
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Africa
and may have evolved from related animal viruses, e.g., the simian virus (SIV).
Though reported cases of infection with HIV-2 strain are still rare (compared to the prevalence of HIV-1 infection) in other parts of the world, globalization may alter this demography if the HIV-2 strain infection is not contained in
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Africa
.
AIDS Epidemic Around the World. After
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Sub-Saharan Africa
, some countries in
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Latin America and the Caribbean
, especially the Caribbean countries have the second highest rate of
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HIV
infection in the world. There is also an alarming increase of
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HIV
infection in some of the
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Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia
. In comparison with
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Sub-Saharan Africa
or the Caribbean, the rate of infection is lower (<1%) in many of the
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Asia and the Pacific
countries. The exceptions are Cambodia, Myanmar and Thailand where the rate of infection exceeds 1% among 15-49-year-olds. However, with the huge total population of the Asian region, even a small percentage increase of
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HIV
infection would translate into a significant number of people living with
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HIV/AIDS
. India, for example, has about 4 million people living with
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HIV/AIDS
, one of the highest in the world.
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Earlier inaction among many leaders in less developed countries may have contributed to why almost 70% of the 40 million living with
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HIV/AIDS
in the world reside in countries of
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Sub-Saharan Africa
. However, there are many contributory factors. The vestiges of centuries of colonialism left very unstable feudal systems where wealth is concentrated in the very few. Endemic poverty among the majority of the population led to forced servitude and prostitution. Despair from impoverished conditions also formented drug use where they are readily available. And drug use among the poor encourages prostitution to support the habit. Political instability also led to civil strifes that formented mobility among the general population and the prominence of the military culture in many of the less developed countries.
All the above factors created the conditions that led to rapid spread of the disease.
In some countries, certain cultural practices and traditions, such as circumcision, tattooing, breast feeding, etc. contributed to the spread of the disease. Even the custom of taking the wife of a dead relative -- meant to stabilize the society by avoiding destitution of the widowed wife -- became a fertile mechanism of spreading the disease.
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Worldwide
&
Sub-Saharan African countries most affected by HIV/AIDS
AIDS Maps of Africa:
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Overview:
HIV-1
&
HIV-2;
High-Risk
&
Low-Risk Populations
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East,
West,
Central,
Southern and
Northern Africa
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Notes and Footnotes:
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Read the "Notes", tabulated data and references in
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HIV/AIDS Surveillance Data Base
, for definition of terms and actual values used in the figures.
Definitions:
High risk -- prostitutes and clients, STD patients, or other persons
with known risk factors.
Low risk -- pregnant women, blood donors, or other persons with no
known risk factors.
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Click on Literature Sources
to access the source of the information database, specified as superscript after each topic link.
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