Unicef ​​report More and more teen Aidstote

In poor countries more and more youthful Aidstote

12/01/2013

Unicef ​​raises the alarm: More and more teenagers are dying of AIDS, especially in poorer countries. 110,000 were alone last year. With more money, according to the Children's Fund, the death rate could be lowered.

Increase of over 50 percent
Especially in the poorer countries, more and more young people die of HIV infection. This is the result of a report by the United Nations Children's Fund Unicef. Accordingly, the death rate has risen dramatically in recent years. According to information, 71,000 young people died in poorer countries in 2005, compared to 110,000 last year. This represents an increase of nearly 55 percent. As young people, the United Nations defines people between the ages of ten and 19. Around 2.1 million of them would have had to live with the disease in 2012.

Unicef ​​demands more money
The problem could, according to the UN helpers, be dealt with more effectively. For example, by the year 2020, a program of 5.5 billion US dollars (around four billion euros) could prevent the infection of two million young people. The budget in 2010 was $ 3.8 billion.

50,000 signatures handed over in Berlin
Germany too has a duty to do more. On Friday in Berlin, for example, a merger of various initiatives called for the Federal Chancellor to at least double the German contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Germany currently pays about 200 million euros annually. As a spokesman for „Action Alliance against AIDS“ announced that talks in the Chancellor's office had been positive after the presentation of 50,000 signatures. Since 2002, the Fund has provided AIDS medicines for the treatment of 5.3 million people.

Transmission from mothers to children significantly curtailed
Great successes have been achieved according to Unicef ​​in children. Thus, the transmission of the disease from mothers to children had been significantly reduced. Even though 260,000 children were infected with HIV last year, seven years earlier, 540,000 more than twice as many.

Children must be the first to benefit from success
One third of the infected children would die without treatment before the first birthday and half of them would not experience their second birthday. „Children must be the first to benefit from our success in fighting HIV. And they must be the last ones to suffer our failure“, Unicef ​​director Anthony Lake. „Today, the child of an infected pregnant woman no longer has to suffer the same fate.“

Number of sick children in Africa has dropped
In the most severely affected part of the world, in Africa, according to Unicef, the number of sick children in many countries has fallen significantly. Around 76 percent in Ghana or 58 percent in Namibia. But in poorer countries only about one third of the children get the necessary treatment. In contrast, it is almost two-thirds of adults. Additional problems could also arise in the future after a new HIV virus has been discovered in West Africa. For example, scientists in Guinea-Bissau, West Africa, have discovered a new HIV virus that is supposed to lead to a faster AIDS illness. Like the transmitter „Voice of America“ According to data from the Swedish Lund University, it takes about six years on average in the hitherto prevalent HIV strains from the time of infection to the outbreak of AIDS. The new A3 / O2 pathogens are on average one year faster.

78,000 people live in Germany with HIV
In AIDS prevention programs, adolescents should be addressed in a more targeted manner, according to the demand of the World Population Foundation in Hanover. Their managing director Renate Bähr said: „The latest figures show that more young people need access to education and contraception.“ Especially girls have a high risk of becoming infected with HIV. At the end of 2012, around 78,000 people in Germany were living with HIV, among them around 200 children and adolescents up to the age of 15 years. About 550 people died in Germany in the past year as a result of AIDS. (Ad)

Picture: Gerd Altmann