Since 1988, World Aids Day has been held on December 1 to promote awareness of HIV/Aids around the globe. UNAids, the United Nations organisation for HIV/Aids, sums up its focus as "Zero new HIV infections. Zero discrimination. Zero Aids-related deaths".
According to UNAids, in 2009, 21 years after the first World Aids Day, there were an estimated 4.9 million people living with HIV across Asia. This number is almost equivalent to the population of Singapore. An estimated 300,000 in the region died of Aids-related illnesses.
HIV, which stands for human immunodeficiency virus, can lead to acquired immune deficiency syndrome, or Aids. At present, people can live much longer - even decades - with HIV before they develop Aids, because of "highly active" combinations of medications introduced in the mid-1990s.
The prevalence of HIV in Hong Kong is much lower than in most other parts of Asia. Nonetheless, according to Hong Kong government data, there has been a general upward trend in the number of those newly diagnosed with HIV each year, from 28 in 1988 to 438 last year. The increase in new diagnoses may reflect a real rise in the incidence of the virus, or an increase in the number of people being tested, or both.
The number of new Aids diagnoses each year in Hong Kong has also increased, from seven in 1988 to 82 last year. But as a proportion of new HIV diagnoses each year, new Aids diagnoses have fallen from 25 per cent in 1988 to 19 per cent last year. As Hong Kong residents have access to affordable HIV medical care, the decline may represent improved health care and HIV management.
The Hong Kong Aids Foundation's message this World Aids Day is that HIV is a chronic, not terminal, disease. The shift from terminal to chronic illness is mainly due to the development of highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART) medication regimens. But if patients miss more than one of their twice-daily doses of medication a month, the virus may become resistant to the medication. Thus, HIV requires active management to remain chronic, and to prevent its transition into a potentially terminal illness.