Today is World AIDS day

The United Nations disclosed on Monday that new, more sophisticated sampling techniques have led to a dramatic lowering of the estimates in the number of people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide; which represents the first waning in the growth of this pandemic since HIV was discovered in 1981.

Ironically, this good news was offset by reports that the number of Americans becoming infected with the virus each year is 50 percent higher than previously estimated. And no where is this trend more concentrated than in the nation’s capital, Washington, DC – where 1 in 20 residents is living with HIV.

Indeed, as the charts below indicate, this virus continues to decimate tens of millions of lives.

Yet it is encouraging to know that aggressive efforts to combat it are making headway (especially in Sub-Saharan Africa). And, apropos this, here’s to US President George W. Bush for urging Congress yesterday to approve his request to double funding (to $30 billion) to continue this (far more worthy) global war on HIV/AIDS.

Keep hope alive!