HIV Diagnoses Rise Among Intravenous Drug Users

ATLANTA (Reuters) – The number of new HIV diagnoses among intravenous drug users in the United States rose in 2000, halting five years of steady declines, according to a federal study released on Thursday.Data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 25 states revealed that 2,514 people who injected drugs had been diagnosed with the virus that causes AIDS in 2000.That figure was about 5 percent higher than in 1999, though considerably lower than the 4,226 infections reported in 1994.The CDC said more data was needed before researchers could conclude that AIDS was poised for a comeback among intravenous drug users, one of the groups at highest risk for the disease.People who inject drugs and their sex partners represent about one-third of all those who have been infected with HIV in the United States since the virus first surfaced in 1981.Tanya Sharpe, a behavioral scientist and an AIDS expert with the CDC, said the increase in diagnoses could have resulted from expanded AIDS testing or a change in risk behavior among intravenous drug users.”It could be that some of the prevention messages have lost their fervor in the communities and the advances in anti-retroviral drug treatment may have lulled some people into a false sense of security,” Sharpe said.She said routine AIDS testing and drug treatment and counseling were the keys to controlling the epidemic among intravenous drug users.Making AIDS tests more common is at the heart of the CDC’s strategy to increase the proportion of HIV-infected persons who are aware that they carry the virus from 70 percent to 95 percent by 2005.As many as 30 percent of the estimated 850,000 to 950,000 people living with the virus in the United States do not know that they are infected. About 16,000 Americans die each year from AIDS and another 40,000 become infected with HIV.(Source: Reuters, Thu July 10, 2003 03:16 PM ET, By Paul Simao)

Posted On: 11 July, 2003

Modified On: 5 December, 2013