I came across an article in todays Washington Post' "Speeding HIV's Deadly Spread" which discussed the transmission of HIV in Botswana. One paragraph caught my eye:

"Fidelity campaigns never caught on in Botswana. Instead, the country focused on remedies favored by Western AIDS experts schooled in the epidemics of America's gay community or Thailand's brothels, where condom use became so routine it slowed the spread of HIV."

This prompted me to do a quick Google search on the current HIV numbers in LoS, and I found this data from http://www.avert.org/aidsthai.htm

"By the end of 2005, national HIV prevalence was 1.4%, down from 1.8% in 2003 and more than 2% a decade earlier."

Thailand Statistics
Estimated total population, July 2005 64,233,000
Est # of people living with HIV, end 2005 580,000

Adults (15+) 560,000
Women (15+) 220,000
Children (0-15) 16,000
Estimated adult HIV prevalence 1.4%
Estimated number of AIDS deaths in 2005 21,000

* The majority of Thailand’s HIV infections (around 80%) occur through heterosexual sex.
* HIV affects more men than women in Thailand; the male-female ratio is nearly 3:1.
* HIV prevalence among pregnant women, which reached a peak of 2.35% in 1995, had fallen to 1.18% by 2003.
* The distribution of antiretroviral drugs has coincided with a dramatic drop in the number of officially reported AIDS-deaths – from 5,020 in 2004 to 1,640 in 2005.

I wonder if the "heterosexual" AIDS stats include men who have sex with Katoeys? If so that would skew the numbers and the actual rate of transmission between men and women would actually be lower.

I have no idea what the facts are, but those statistics are total fabrications if you analyze them at all.

One for instance, "By the end of 2005, national HIV prevalence was 1.4%, down from 1.8% in 2003"

A .4% decrease in two years. .4% of 64 million would be over a quarter of a million fewer people living with HIV in 2005 than in 2003. Where did they all go? Maybe a quarter of a million people died and there were no new infections during those two years? How could that be? Only one way. Either the 1.4% figure or the 1.8% figure is bullshit or more likely both are fabricated and no one knows the true figure.

That's just one quick for instance.

If you sit down and crunch those numbers you can find so many contradictions and obvious HUGE inaccuracies that the the statistics are sadly useless.

Population growth. The number of births could easily account for the change in prevalence.

AS Mark Twain once wrote "statistics are like a lady of the evening,once you get them laid down, you can pretty much do what you want with them" Mojo.

Remember, these are also "estimates" not exact figures. There might be the same exact number of infected HIV carriers in the Philippines only the Catholic culture and macho culture stigma prevent them from submitting accurate results. Just doesnt make sense that a country like the Philippines where nobody uses condoms has a lower rate than Thailand whom have a much higer rate of condom use, better AIDS education, etc. I think the Phils keeps their AIDS deaths under wraps as their HIV positive results as well. The only difference is that there may be a higher use of needles via drug use.

Actually, in Thailand where most people who contract HIV and develop AIDS do NOT get therapy, or at least not effective therapy (Thaksins cheap 30 baht a day healthcare aside--and I've seen that in action, it's a joke, but that's another thread) most people do die. More telling would have been the incidence, or the frequency of new infections, but in terms of the economic impact on the country and drain on it's healthcare system to the extent that there is any support for those people, prevalence (proportion of people currently infected), is more relevant.

What we don't know from the statistics is how advanced the cases of HIV/AIDS are in those that are infected. For example, if the public health intervention program has been ramping up over the last 2-3 years, and it has been very effective, the infected population could be significantly skewed to individuals who are more than 3 years infected and at highest risk of dying. Thus the prevalence can drop off fairly quickly over a 2 or 3 year period, depending on what is going on in the public health care arena to prevent new infections.