The United States, where 1.2 million Americans are currently living with the HIV/AIDS virus, is one of the countries most affected. And new rates show that the number of HIV/AIDS new infections is much higher than the U.S. government was expecting: the country had 56,300 new HIV infections in 2006, almost 20,000 more cases than the last 12 years’ figure. 34% of the newly infected people are aged between 13-29 and 27% of all the newly infected are female.

The new calculation is a result of a better blood tests and new statistical methods that provide a better way to understand how fast the disease is growing.

New tests can now also tell how recent an HIV infection has occurred – separating infections that occurred within the past five months from those that are older. It also allows to recognise trends in the spread of the epidemic and it shows, for instance, how infections are increasing among straight people and injection drug users, though younger gay and bisexual men are still more vulnerable to get the disease than other groups.

There certainly is a need for new and effective prevention campaigns – also aimed at the African-American community, as the new CDC report links over half of all new infections to this community. Remeber: prevention is still the most important weapon in the fight against this dramatic infection.