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Young lead safe sex revolution against AIDS

14 July 2010

Young people in Africa are leading a “revolution” in HIV prevention and driving down rates of the disease by having safer sex and fewer sexual partners, the United Nations AIDS programme says.

The prevalence of the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS is falling among young people in 16 of the 25 countries most affected by the disease, a study by UNAIDS found, with many of them on track to hit a 25% reduction target in HIV/AIDS rates in 15- to 24-year-olds by the end of the year.

In a study published ahead a global AIDS conference due to be held in Vienna next week, UNAIDS found that in 16 of the 25 worst affected countries, rates of HIV had been falling among young people, with some of the most dramatic declines seen in Kenya, where there was a 60% change between 2000 and 2005.

Botswana, Ivory Coast, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia and Zimbabwe have all achieved a goal set agreed in 2001 to reduce HIV prevalence in 15 to 24-year-olds by 25% by 2010, it said. Burundi, Lesotho, Rwanda, Swaziland, the Bahamas and Haiti were all “œlikely to achieve” it.

Condom use was also on the increase, the study found, with 10 countries reporting more use of condoms among women and 13 reporting increased condom use among men. Cameroon, Tanzania and Uganda reported increases in condom use by both sexes.

Read more at TimesLive.