HIV

HIV continues to be one of the most important communicable diseases in the UK. It is an infection associated with serious morbidity, high costs of treatment and care, significant mortality and high number of potential years of life lost. Each year, many thousands of individuals are diagnosed with HIV for the first time. The infection is still frequently regarded as stigmatising and has a prolonged ‘silent’ period during which it often remains undiagnosed. Highly active antiretroviral therapies have resulted in substantial reductions in AIDS incidence and deaths in the UK.

Latest HIV Reports available from Publications

	HIV Surveillance at HPA
	The new HIV and AIDS Reporting System (HARS) A new data system, the HIV and AIDS Reporting System (HARS), has been developed by the HPA. This system will eventually replace the reporting of SOPHID and new HIV diagnoses. The HARS dataset has been designed to collect data to enhance public health surveillance outputs and support commissioning. ›› The new HIV and AIDS Reporting System...
	Overall HIV Prevalence HIV prevalence is defined as the proportion of people in a population who are infected with HIV. The HPA conducts a series of surveys (UAPMP) in different populations: pregnant women, injecting drug users and genitourinary medicine clinic attendees. These surveys test anonymised samples and measure the prevalence of both diagnosed and undiagnosed HIV infection. ›› Overall HIV Prevalence statistics...
	Receiving HIV care HPA records data for all individuals with diagnosed HIV infection who attend for HIV-related care within the NHS in England. The Survey of Prevalent HIV Infections Diagnosed (SOPHID) is the name of the HPA's surveillance schemes which collects this data. ›› Receiving care statistics...
	New HIV Diagnoses The main sources of information on newly diagnosed HIV/AIDS infection come from voluntary case reporting of HIV/AIDS from laboratory reports of newly diagnosed HIV infections by microbiologists and HIV/AIDS diagnoses by clinicians. ›› New HIV Diagnoses statistics...
	HIV Incidence HIV incidence is the number of new HIV infections in the population during a certain time period. People who were infected before that time period are not included in the total, even if they are still alive. ››New HIV Incidence statistics...
	HIV Treatment Resistance Data on resistance to antiretroviral treatment in HIV infected drug-naïve individuals is crucial to understanding the epidemiology of transmitted drug resistance, while data from those receiving antiretroviral treatment provides indirect evidence of the contribution of drug resistance to virological failure. ›› HIV Treatment Resistance...
	CD4 Surveillance The National CD4 Surveillance scheme monitors trends in immunosuppression associated with HIV infection by collecting data on CD4 T-lymphocyte (CD4 cell) counts performed by laboratories in England and Wales. ›› CD4 statistics...
	HIV Testing The Health Protection Agency (HPA) recommends that routine HIV testing should be commissioned as a priority for all general medical admissions in high prevalence areas (defined as ≥2 per 1,000 among 15-59 year olds). HIV testing by general practitioners should be widely promoted, especially in high prevalence areas, although further consideration should be given to the best model of expanding testing in primary care. On this page we provide links to testing guidelines and other resources to help with the implementation of these recommendations. ›› HIV Testing...