Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Everyone has AIDS...Again?
According to new numbers, AIDS is going to take over the world again.... It's an epidemic, no, its a pandemic, no, it's neither air-borne nor naturally contagious.
For some reason (perhaps other than money?), the World is paying attention to the alleged AIDS pandemic. You can read more on it here.
Call me heartless, but the numbers tell a slightly different story.
According to UNAIDS own numbers, individuals with AIDS represent slightly more than a half of one percent of the global population. Not quite as far reaching (even with the likelihood of their estimate being on the high side) as they claim. Additionally, what rate of growth deems the usage of words like "epidemic" and "pandemic" appropriate? I am sure that it wouldn't be something quite as low the only seven percent increase over the last two years. Given that AIDS patients have a fairly long life expectancy after infection, these numbers aren't going to be influenced by deaths as signficantly. Lastly, it is rather common practice to take into account population growth rates when estimating these types of numbers, so the growth rate might be substantially lower than below.
In 2004, individuals living with AIDS represented approximately 36,900,000. As of yesterday it was 39,500,000. That represents a Growth Rate of approximately 7.0%.
In 2004(12/31), the World Population was 6,486,626,360. As of yesterday it was 6,665,842,873. That represents a Growth Rate of approximately 2.8%.
Percentage of Population (AIDS/World) in 2004 was 0.57%. As of yesterday it was 0.59%.
Not quite the alarmist effect that is so heavily preached...
One note of interest from the UNAIDS article is this line:
Two-thirds of infections are due to shared injecting equipment.
For some reason (perhaps other than money?), the World is paying attention to the alleged AIDS pandemic. You can read more on it here.
Call me heartless, but the numbers tell a slightly different story.
According to UNAIDS own numbers, individuals with AIDS represent slightly more than a half of one percent of the global population. Not quite as far reaching (even with the likelihood of their estimate being on the high side) as they claim. Additionally, what rate of growth deems the usage of words like "epidemic" and "pandemic" appropriate? I am sure that it wouldn't be something quite as low the only seven percent increase over the last two years. Given that AIDS patients have a fairly long life expectancy after infection, these numbers aren't going to be influenced by deaths as signficantly. Lastly, it is rather common practice to take into account population growth rates when estimating these types of numbers, so the growth rate might be substantially lower than below.
In 2004, individuals living with AIDS represented approximately 36,900,000. As of yesterday it was 39,500,000. That represents a Growth Rate of approximately 7.0%.
In 2004(12/31), the World Population was 6,486,626,360. As of yesterday it was 6,665,842,873. That represents a Growth Rate of approximately 2.8%.
Percentage of Population (AIDS/World) in 2004 was 0.57%. As of yesterday it was 0.59%.
Not quite the alarmist effect that is so heavily preached...
One note of interest from the UNAIDS article is this line:
Two-thirds of infections are due to shared injecting equipment.
