Total US AIDS Deaths Top 440,000, With Up to 950,000 HIV Infected

WASHINGTON—AIDS deaths in the United States total more than 440,000 since 1981, according to a new Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) fact sheet. The number of HIV-infected Americans now stands at an estimated 850,000 to 950,000, one quarter of whom do not know they carry the virus. 

Nonetheless, HHS said, significant progress has been made against the AIDS epidemic in the 2 decades since it began. AIDS infections dropped from a peak of roughly 150,000 a year to some 40,000 annually by the early 1990s. Mother-to-child HIV infection has declined from 2,500 in 1992 to 300 to 400 annually in recent years.