World AIDS Day Is a Grim Reminder That We Have Many Pandemics Going On

Observed every December 1, World AIDS Day is a grim reminder that while we’re trying to constrain COVID-19, humanity is still in the midst of multiple pandemics—and one of them has already killed about 33 million people over four decades.


In 2019, according to UNAIDS, an estimated 38 million people were living with HIV globally and “around 690,000 people died from AIDS-related illnesses worldwide.” The encouraging news—as encouraging as such lethal news can be—is that 2019’s mortality marked a 60 percent reduction since 2004, the peak year of AIDS deaths.

But the decline we’ve seen for 15-years may be interrupted, sadly, for the HIV and novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) pandemics are crashing into each other.