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CNN Live At Daybreak

Grim News Coming Out of World AIDS Conference

Aired July 08, 2002 - 05:34   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: And some grim news coming out of the World AIDS Conference, which opened yesterday in Spain. Some 40 million people worldwide are infected with the AIDS virus. The poorest nations are hit hardest. The richest nations are faring a little better.

CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta is attending that conference.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Experts spent much of the day actually painting a picture of what the scourge of AIDS has done around the world. They have compared the West to the rest of the world. They have looked at treatment rates. They have looked at prevalence rates. And they have pointed the United States to the fact that while HIV infection, AIDS infection rates dropped between '94 and '98, they have subsequently stabilized.

That has experts very concerned in the United States about apathy towards the disease, about complacency with the medications. Most remarkably, of new infections, of new heterosexual infections, 50 percent of those are occurring in African-American women, 25 percent in African-American men. And no question, 75 percent, fully 75 percent of all new heterosexual HIV infections are occurring in African-Americans. That certainly has people concerned, as well.

They have also pointed to the fact that access to treatment still obviously saves lives and they have compared and contrasted the West and the rest of the world, the West being the United States and Western Europe, where over 500,000 people are undergoing treatment and 25,000 people have died. Compare that now to Africa, where 2.2 million people have died and only 30,000 have received treatment.

There's no question that access to treatment remains a huge issue within the AIDS community. Prevention and treatment are the cornerstones by which everything is being measured.

Now, there is a little bit of prevention that is being talked about and there will be treatment that is being talked about later on in the week, as well. We've also heard some discouraging and concerning news about treatment in the form of anti-viral resistance. They specifically talk about some of the best retro anti-virals, one of them being NNRTI. The name is not that important, but what is important is that over the last few years, resistance for that drug has increased from zero to 13 percent.

So certainly there are a lot of numbers being thrown around. There are not promises of vaccines. There are not promises of new medications. But there are charges and renewed energy towards relying on some of the old gold standard treatment and prevention mechanisms. That is something we're going to hear a lot about over the next few days and we'll certainly be reporting on that.

There was a demonstration here today where people were talking about access to HIV medications. That's certainly something that we've been hearing a lot about, as well, and we'll probably continue to hear some of that from some of the demonstrators over the week, as well. We'll certainly keep you up to date on that.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, Barcelona, Spain.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: And there is more disturbing news out of the AIDS conference. A study of young gay and bisexual men in the United States found more than three quarters of them are infected with the HIV virus and they were unaware they actually had the AIDS virus.

CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta will talk more about that this morning at 7:00 Eastern on AMERICAN MORNING with Paula Zahn.

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