World AIDS day

Published: 01.12.11 Updated: 01.12.2011 12:11:32

Marking World AIDS Day 2011, ECDC and the WHO Regional Office for Europe released their joint publication “HIV/AIDS Surveillance in Europe 2010: Surveillance report”. The new data raises concern about the continuing transmission of HIV in Europe, as newly diagnosed HIV infections are still on the increase.

In 2010, were reported 27,116 newly diagnosed cases of HIV infection across the European Union and the European Economic Area (EU/EEA) indicating an increase of around 4%. In contrast, the steady decrease of AIDS cases continued in 2010 with 4.666 reported cases in the EU/EEA region. This constitutes a decrease of nearly 50% in reported AIDS cases from 2004 to 2010.

The HIV epidemics are remarkably distinct in individual countries but overall HIV infection continues to disproportionately affect certain key populations, in particular men who have sex with men, persons originating from countries with generalised HIV epidemics and people who inject drugs.

ECDC has published a Guidance on HIV testing and the joint ECDC–EMCDDA Prevention and control of infectious diseases among people who inject drugs. These evidence-based guidance reports aim to assist in shaping effective national HIV/AIDS policies as both people who inject drugs as well as HIV positive persons who are unaware of their infection are main populations at risk for transmission of HIV.

Read more on the websites of ECDC and WHO EURO (also in Russian).