Dec 1, 2009, 13:16 GMT
Dhaka - Bangladeshi Health Minister Ruhul Haque on Tuesday said some 39 people were died from Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) in the country so far in 2009, raising the death toll from the deadly virus to 204 in the last 20 years.
Releasing an official count on Human Immunodeficiency Virus infection on the occasion of World AIDS Day, Haque said that the health department reported 250 cases of HIV, 143 of whom were diagnosed with AIDS.
He observed that the prevalence of HIV among injecting drug users was 9 per cent while it was 1 per cent in other risk groups, including sex workers.
'We are intensifying surveillance and the campaign against HIV/AIDS as the prevalence of the disease among high-risk groups is rising alarmingly,' Haque told a press conference.
According to official data, some 1,745 people have been affected by HIV since the first case of HIV infection was detected in the Muslim-majority country in 1989.
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