(introduction...)

Johannesburg, 30 November 1998

Africa continues to dwarf the rest of the world on the AIDS balance sheet. According to UNAIDS and WHO estimates, 7 out of 10 people newly infected with HIV in 1998 live in sub-Saharan Africa; among children under 15, the proportion is 9 out of 10. Of all AIDS deaths since the epidemic started, 83% have been in the region. At least 95% of all AIDS orphans have been African.* Yet only one-tenth of the world’s population lives in Africa south of the Sahara.

The sheer number of Africans affected by the epidemic is overwhelming. Since the start of the epidemic, an estimated 34 million people living in sub-Saharan Africa have been infected with HIV. Some 11.5 million of those people have already died, a quarter of them children. In the course of 1998, AIDS will have been responsible for an estimated two million funerals in Africa.

By the end of 1998, there will be an estimated 21.5 million men and women living with HIV in Africa, plus another 1 million children. Some 4 million of these people will have contracted the infection in 1998 alone.