HIV, tuberculosis and the Millennium Development Goals

An estimated 33 million people worldwide were living with HIV at the end of 2007, almost half of whom were women, with 2.7 million new HIV infections and 2 million HIV-related deaths in that year. Two-thirds of people living with HIV are in sub-Saharan Africa, where around 60% of infections are in women, and where 75% of AIDS-related deaths occur. The southern African sub-region is the most severely affected, where 35% of the global HIV infections and 38% of AIDS deaths occurred in 2007. Worldwide, 45% of the estimated 2.7 million new infections annually occur in young people aged 15—24 years, an age group in which young girls are particularly susceptible to infection and in which pregnancy is common. The number of children younger than 15 years living with HIV has continued to increase from 1.6 million in 2001 to 2.0 million in 2007. While new infections in children have shown some decline with increased access to strategies to prevent mother-to-child transmission, an estimated 370000 children younger than 15 years still became infected with HIV in 2007. This remains a predominantly African problem, with 90% of infections and over 90% of an estimated 270 000 HIV-related deaths in the region in 2007.

HIV is the strongest link between the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) 4, 5 and 6. A response to the global HIV/AIDS pandemic is in itself a major component of the MDGs, with MDG 6 specifically addressing the HIV epidemic.