HIV cases up – DOH

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Health (DOH) recorded a total of 295 new HIV cases last October, up from the 200 cases registered during the same period last year.

Based on the DOH’s Philippines HIV and AIDS Registry, the new infections brought to 2,761 the number of HIV cases since January this year, including 148 AIDS cases and 11 deaths.

The registry showed that of the 295 cases, 93 percent were males while 57 percent were in their productive ages of 20 to 29 years.

Sexual contact was the primary mode of transmission for 286 cases, with the men-who-have-sex-with-men (MSM) accounting for 83 percent of them. 

Nine of the cases were injecting drug users who shared infected needles.

Commercial sex workers used to be the primary contributors to the country’s HIV/AIDS cases until 2007, when “there has been a shift in the predominant trend of sexual transmission from heterosexual to MSM.”

But in his Twitter account, DOH Assistant Secretary Eric Tayag said that there are now “more men (who) use condoms as the DOH projects that more men will get HIV infection in this generation.”