{Education} Article: UNAIDS report on World AIDS Day

• The latest report from UNAIDS (the United Nations agency set up in 1996 to combat HIV infection), which was published on November 20th in anticipation of World AIDS Day on December 1st, states that the rate of new HIV infections is falling in many parts of the world, but most notably in sub-Saharan Africa. 
• Though AIDS first came to prominence in America, it originated in Africa and has always been, primarily, an African disease. It still is. 
• About 70% of new infections are in the sub-Saharan part of the continent. But the number of such infections there has fallen from 2.6m in 1998 (the peak) to 1.8m in 2011. 
• Reasons for this include changes in people’s sexual behaviour, such as reduced promiscuity and more frequent use of condoms; the spread of antiretroviral drugs which, in addition to saving the lives of those infected, also stop them passing the virus on; reductions in mother-to-child transmission; and a new fashion for circumcision amongst Africa’s men. Having the snip has been shown to be a particularly effective way of cutting transmission rates.