The global AIDS epidemic spread at an alarming pace last year with a record 4.8 million new infections, said a UN report released on Tuesday. The report expressed concern that the virus is spreading quickly in Europe and Asia.Issued in advance of the 15th International AIDS Conference which opens on Sunday in Bangkok, the report said that governments were not doing enough to prevent the spread of AIDS.Thirty-eight million people worldwide were estimated to have HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, the report said, adding that only one in five people worldwide have access to prevention programmes. Africa continued to have the world’s highest incidence of AIDS, but Eastern Europe and Central Asia are suffering from the fastest rate of growth in HIV infections, officials said.Prevention has been inadequate in Asia ‘‘partly because of stigma and discrimination,’’ the report said, adding that 7.4 million people are living with HIV in Asia. China and India have severe epidemics in a number of provinces and states, the UN said, while infections among intravenous drug users have soared in Indonesia and Vietnam. ‘‘There’s a window of opportunity to get prevention programmes up to scale in Asia,’’ said Kathleen Cravero, deputy executive director of the Joint UN programme on HIV ‘‘If we miss it, we will see an epidemic like we never imagined,’’ she added. —(LAT-WP)
