Source: ABC News, 3 July 2019
Australia has solidified its reputation as a world leader in HIV prevention, recording its lowest number of new HIV cases in almost two decades.
However, challenges remain in reducing transmission among heterosexuals and the Indigenous population.
New figures released today by the Kirby Institute at the University of New South Wales reveal 835 HIV diagnoses were made in 2018, the lowest number on record since 2001.
The figure represents a 23 per cent decline in cases nationally in the past five years, to a rate that is nearing a third of what it was at the peak of the AIDS epidemic in 1987.
“This reduction is very encouraging,” said Professor Rebecca Guy, head of the Kirby Institute’s Surveillance, Evaluation and Research Program.
“Although we’ve seen reductions in recent years in some Australian states, in 2018 we saw significant reductions at a national level.”
She said widespread HIV testing and treatment, alongside the introduction of HIV preventative medicine Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, or PrEP, was behind the public health success.