Asia and Pacific

In 2009, an estimated 4.9 million people in Asia were living with HIV, including 360 000 who became newly infected that year. The overall trends in this region hide important variation in the epidemics, both between and within countries. Most national HIV epidemics appear to have stabilized and no country in the region has a generalized epidemic. However, in many countries in the region, the epidemic is concentrated in a relatively small number of provinces. Injecting drug users, men who have sex with men and sex workers and their clients have accounted for most of the new infections, and ongoing transmission to the female partners of drug users and the clients of sex workers is becoming apparent.

The HIV epidemic in the Pacific region is small, but the number of people living with HIV in this region nearly doubled between 2001 and 2009—from 28 000 to 57 000. However, the number of people newly infected with HIV has begun to decline from 4700 in 2001 to 4500 in 2009. The HIV epidemics in the region are mainly driven by sexual transmission.