Girls particularly at risk: more teenagers die of AIDS

Wednesday, July 25, 2018

Every three minutes, a teenager is infected with the Hi virus. Unicef ​​presents a study that has doubled the number of AIDS victims among adolescents since the beginning of the millennium. Nevertheless, public attention on the subject has diminished.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), at the International AIDS Conference in Amsterdam, draws attention to the fact that every three minutes a young person is infected with the virus HIV. While the number of deaths due to immunodeficiency syndrome among children under 14 has almost halved between the years 2000 and 2017, teen deaths would have doubled over the same period, according to a study presented today.

In 2017, about 1.2 million teenagers were infected with HIV, mostly girls. The report focuses on the plight of women who have been hardest hit by immunodeficiency because of their additional role as providers of HIV-positive children. "In most countries, women and girls do not have access to information," complains Henrietta Fore of Unicef.

Without additional investments, UNICEF predicts that between 2018 and 2030, 3.7 million children and adolescents will be infected with HIV. Probably 1.2 million would die as a result of the immunodeficiency syndrome. If UN targets to reduce mother-to-child transmission and drug supply are met, 1.4 million new infections and 200,000 deaths could be prevented in children and adolescents here. 2030.

Fewer donations

The United Nations Children's Fund complained that child-friendly medicines were scarce available. Donors, pharmaceutical companies and governments should change that, demanded Unicef. Accompanied with warnings of dangerous negligence in the treatment of AIDS, the conference had started in Amsterdam on Monday night. 15,000 experts and activists give their opinion on the strategies for fighting immunodeficiency syndrome at the five-day meeting in the Dutch city

After the number of new infections has decreased in the last ten years, he has increased in some parts of the world, At the same time, public attention and financial support for the fight against the disease, which has already killed about 35 million people around the world, have declined.

Source: n-tv.de