Infectious Diseases and Rare Diseases

Outbreaks - HIV/AIDS, STDs & STIs

It is widely believed that the origin of HIV was in Kinshasa around 1920. Up until 1980, there was no data of people being affected with HIV or developed AIDS. According to available data, it has been suggested that the current epidemic started in the mid to late 1970s and by 1980 HIV may have already spread to five continents thereby infecting 100,000 to 300,000 people. In 1981, cases of Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia, a rare lung infection and Kaposi’s sarcoma, an unusually aggressive cancer were found in people from Los Angeles, New York and California respectively. In 1983, AIDS was reported among the female partners of men suggesting the cause to be heterosexual intercourse. Later that year, it was also found that children can also get the virus from their mother before, during or shortly after birth. In 2006, male circumcision was introduced to reduce the risk of female to male HIV transmission. In 2010, the CAPRISA 004 microbicide trial was declared as a success in reducing HIV infection in women. In 2011, introduction of antiretroviral treatment reduced the risk of HIV infection to 96% among the serodiscordant couples. In 2012, the FDA approved PrEP for HIV-negative people in order to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV. In 2013, AIDS related deaths had fallen 30% since their peak in 2005. In 2016, the number of HIV infected people living in Russia reached 1 million with 64% of all new HIV diagnoses in Europe occurred in Russia.