The HIV epidemic in South Africa: Key findings from 2017 national population-based survey

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Date

2022

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

MDPI

Abstract

South Africa has the largest number of people living with HIV worldwide. South Africa has implemented five population-based HIV prevalence surveys since 2002 aimed at understanding the dynamics and the trends of the epidemic. This paper presents key findings from the fifth HIV prevalence, incidence, and behaviour survey conducted in 2017 following policy, programme, and epidemic change since the prior survey was conducted in 2012. A cross-sectional populationbased household survey collected behavioural and biomedical data on all members of the eligible households. A total of 39,132 respondents from 11,776 households were eligible to participate, of whom 93.6% agreed to be interviewed, and 61.1% provided blood specimens. The provided blood specimens were used to determine HIV status, HIV incidence, viral load, exposure to antiretroviral treatment, and HIV drug resistance. Overall HIV incidence among persons aged 2 years and above was 0.48% which translates to an estimated 231,000 new infections in 2017.

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Keywords

HIV, Antiretroviral (ARV), HIV testing, Public health, South Africa

Citation

Zuma, K. et al. (2022). The HIV epidemic in South Africa: Key findings from 2017 national population-based survey. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(13), 8125. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19138125