The global struggle against AIDS: WHO's strategy

AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) knows no national boundaries. It has been reported from every part of the world. And the number of victims is growing. Today some 150,000 people are believed to be suffering from the disease. By 1991 one million new cases of AIDS could develop in people already infected with human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV--the virus that causes AIDS--predicts the WHO Special Programme on AIDS (SPA). Health care professionals, who have been on the main line of the fight against AIDS since it was first recognized in 1981, are now being joined by contingents of international groups, governments and top-level policymakers in a global attempt to stop its vicious spread. Attendance at conferences on the subject is testimony to this wide, united effort. Last year the Third International Conference on AIDS in Washington DC attracted a record-breaking 6,000 participants (researchers, health care workers and policymakers) from 50 countries (vs 2,800 the previous year) and this January health ministers and/or their colleagues from 148 countries (representing 95% of the world's population) attended the World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programmes for AIDS Prevention, organized by the British Health Ministry and WHO in London. On the following pages, INR provides nurses with an authoritative background on the new developments to the HIV epidemic, current preventive programmes and recommended policies. The first two articles are based on presentations given at ICN's Forum on AIDS at the Council of National Representatives meeting in New Zealand last August.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)