What is the origin of World AIDS Day?

This year, 65438+February 1 Yes 18 World AIDS Day, with the theme of "Pay attention to women and fight AIDS".

Since the first case of AIDS was discovered in 198 1 USA, the spread of HIV in the world has been amazing. In order to raise public awareness of the dangers of AIDS, the World Health Organization has designated 1988 1 every year as World AIDS Day, calling on countries all over the world to hold various activities on this day to publicize and popularize the knowledge of AIDS prevention.

In recent years, AIDS has spread rapidly around the world. According to the latest report 165438+ released by the World Health Organization and AIDS on 23rd, the number of AIDS patients and virus carriers in the world has reached 39.4 million, an increase of 1.6 million over 2003, the highest in history. The report estimates that 3,654.38+million people died of AIDS in 2004, an increase of 200,000 over 2003, setting a record for the number of deaths in a single year. There were 4.9 million new HIV-infected people, exceeding 4.8 million in 2003.

In the prevention and treatment of AIDS, women have become a group that cannot be ignored. The above report pointed out that the proportion of women with AIDS has increased. From the figures, women account for almost half of the more than 37 million adult HIV-infected people in the world, reaching 654.38 million+07.6 million. In 2004, 47% of new infections in the world were women.

As far as the distribution of HIV-infected people is concerned, although the situation in Africa as a whole has greatly improved, sub-Saharan Africa is still the most affected region in the world, with 5.3 million people infected in South Africa. Asia and Eastern Europe have become the regions with the fastest spread of HIV. There are 165438+ million HIV-infected people in East Asia, with a growth rate of 56% in two years. About 1.4 million people in Eastern Europe and Central Asia are infected with HIV, compared with 1 10,000 people two years ago. Since the first case of AIDS was reported in China on 1985, by the end of 2003, there were about 840,000 HIV-infected people and 80,000 AIDS patients in China, and the cumulative number of reported AIDS deaths has exceeded 1000.

The full medical name of AIDS is "acquired immunodeficiency syndrome", which is caused by human immunodeficiency virus. This virus is contagious for life, destroying people's immune system and making people lose their ability to resist various diseases. The routes of transmission of HIV include blood, sexual behavior, drug abuse (drug addicts use syringes) and mother-to-child transmission (mother-to-child transmission of HIV). Up to now, there are no effective drugs and treatments for AIDS in the international medical community. Therefore, AIDS is also called "super cancer" and "century killer".

AIDS has become an important public health and social hot issue of global concern. Although there are no effective drugs and specific preventive vaccines against AIDS at present, AIDS can be completely prevented. Advocating a healthy lifestyle, leading an honest and clean life and maintaining noble moral sentiments are the most effective ways to prevent the spread of AIDS.

References:

Xinhuanet: Background information: World AIDS Day