More than a million Russians are now HIV-positive, as rates of infection in the country reach an all-time high. Vadim Pokrovsky, head of the Russian State AIDS Center said that at least one million and possibly as many as 1.5 million Russians were now HIV-positive, Independent News Website reported. This means that a little over 1% of Russia’s 144 million inhabitants now test positive for the virus, or that Russia has more cases of HIV per person than any other European country.
“The epidemic is gathering strength,” Pokrovsky added. “Unfortunately, the measures that have been taken have clearly not been enough.” There were 90,000 new cases in Russia in 2014, and the AIDS center further estimated that the number of HIV infections would reach 2 million by 2019.
