UNAIDS 2008 Report on the global AIDS epidemic reports that there have been significant gains in preventing new HIV infections in Zimbabwe.
The report cited changes in sexual behaviour as having contributed significantly to the declines in the number of new HIV infections.
Condom use was also said to be increasing among young people with multiple partners, not only in Zimbabwe but in many countries especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Another encouraging sign is that young people are waiting longer to have sexual intercourse, according to the report. This has been seen in seven of the most affected countries: Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Uganda and Zambia.
In Cameroon the percentage of young people having sex before the age of 15 has gone down from 35% to 14%.
The epidemiological statistics, however, reveal that Sub-Saharan Africa still remains the region most heavily affected by HIV worldwide, “accounting for two thirds (67%) of all people living with HIV and for three quarters (75%) of AIDS deaths in 2007” although the statistics vary significantly from country to country.
South Africa, with an estimated 5.7 million people living with HIV, continues to be the largest epidemic in the world and infections are growing in Mozambique where adult prevalence has exceeded 20 per cent.
“Reductions in HIV prevalence are especially striking in Zimbabwe, where HIV prevalence in pregnant women attending antenatal clinics fell from 26% in 2002 to 18% in 2006,” said the report.
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