A new report of the AIDS epidemic produced by researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed some pessimistic results. The number of people infected each year with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is now estimated to be 56,300 - 40 percent higher than the previous estimate, according to the latest CDC results. The CDC spends about $750 million a year on AIDS prevention. Dr. Kevin Fenton, who heads the CDC's AIDS branch, said 15,000 to 18,000 Americans die every year of AIDS.

Infection rates haven’t exploded radically since 1998. But rates are high for men who have sex with men. Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the CDC, told the New York Times, "We are not effectively reaching men who have sex with men and African-Americans to lower their risk."

More than a quarter of gay men in countries like Jamaica, Kenya, and Ghana, are also infected, according to the United Nations. The sad thing is that gay populations have been ignored due to discrimination. It’s high time this stopped, Peter Piot, the executive director of New York-based UNAIDS, the agency that coordinates care and research, explained. “In many countries homosexual activity is against the law,” Piot said in an interview at the meeting. “It is underground and impossible to organize these programs.”

New blood tests are now able to tell when the infection occured.

Globally, 33 million people are infected with the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS and 2 million die of it each year. In the U.S.A. however the rate of new HIV infections has declined about 80 percent at least for ntravenous drug users. The rates for the ones involved in heterosexual activities are quite stable.