Sub-Saharan Africa is by far the hardest hit region with 28.5 million people living with HIV/AIDS. In 2001, the disease killed 6,300 people a day there.
In Asia and the Pacific, an estimated 7.1 million people are now living with HIV/AIDS. With more than half the world’s population, the epidemic in this region threatens to become the largest in the world. “The question is no longer whether Asia will have a major epidemic, but rather how massive it will be,” warns UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot.