London - Teenagers, and particularly
girls, are bearing the brunt of the global AIDS epidemic with
around 30 adolescents becoming infected with HIV every hour,
according to a report by the United Nations children's fund
UNICEF.
Of those 30 new infections each hour among 15- to 19-year-olds in 2017, around 20 - or two-thirds - were in girls,
UNICEF said, representing a "crisis of health as well as a
crisis of agency".
While there has been substantial progress in the fight
against AIDS in the last two decades, the failure to prevent so
many new infections among children and teenagers is slowing this
down, the report said.
It said the epidemic's spread among adolescent girls is
being fuelled by early sex, including with older men, forced
sex, powerlessness in negotiating around sex, poverty and lack
of access to confidential counselling and testing services.
"In most countries, women and girls lack access to
information, to services, or even just the power to say no to
unsafe sex," said Henrietta Fore, UNICEF's executive director.
"HIV thrives among the most vulnerable and marginalized, leaving
teenage girls at the centre of the crisis."
UNICEF's report, presented on Wednesday at an AIDS
conference in Amsterdam, said that 130 000 children aged 19 and
under died from AIDS last year, while 430 000 – almost 50 an
hour – were newly infected.
Adolescents between the ages of 10 and 19 account for almost
two thirds of the 3 million under-19 year-olds living with HIV.
And while AIDS-related deaths among all other age groups have
been falling since 2010, those among older adolescents aged 15
to 19 have seen no reduction.
Angelique Kidjo, a UNICEF goodwill ambassador who
contributed to the report, said economic empowerment and
education were crucial.
"We need to make girls and women secure enough economically
that they don't have to turn to sex work," she said. "We need to
make sure they have the right information about how HIV is
transmitted and how to protect themselves."
UNAIDS says the fight against the AIDS epidemic - in which
37 million people worldwide are infected with the incurable HIV
virus - is at a "precarious point", with deaths falling,
treatment rates rising, but rates of new HIV infections
stubbornly high.