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Adolescents, particularly women, are the most affected by the global AIDS epidemic and about 30 people between the ages of 15 and 19 are infected with HIV every hour, according to a report by the United Nations Development Fund (UNFPA) childhood (UNICEF).
Of the 30 infections per hour among youth in 2017, about 20, or two-thirds, were women, UNICEF said, representing a "health crisis."
Although there has been a substantial advance in the fight against AIDS over the last two decades, the failure to prevent as many new infections among children and adolescents is slowing these efforts, according to The report.
According to the document, the spread of the epidemic among adolescents is encouraged by sex at an early age, forced relationships, poverty and lack of access to confidential counseling and services. screening.
"In most countries, women and girls do not have access to information and services, or even only the power to say no to unprotected sex," Henrietta said. Fore, Executive Director of UNICEF
"HIV is spreading among the most vulnerable and marginalized, placing adolescents at the center of the crisis."
The UNICEF report, presented at a conference in Amsterdam on Wednesday, states that 130,000 children under the age of 19 died of AIDS last year, while 430,000 children – nearly 50 per hour – were infected.
Adolescents aged 10-19 respond to nearly two-thirds of the 3 million individuals under 19 living with HIV. And even though AIDS-related deaths among all other age groups have declined since 2010, they have not registered a decline among adolescents aged 15 to 19 years.
Angelique Kidjo, a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF who contributed to the report, said that economic empowerment and education are crucial.
"We need to make girls and women generally economically stable so that they do not have to resort to sex work," he said.
"We need to make sure they have adequate information about HIV transmission and how to protect themselves," he added. (Reuters)
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