The Asia-Pacific region has reached a defining point in its HIV/AIDS epidemic, according to a UNAIDS statement. A new report from UNAIDS shows impressive advances in decreasing new infections and increasing access to antiretroviral therapy. However, those gains are juxtaposed with intense stigma and discrimination against the most at-risk populations: people who buy and sell sex, injection drug users, men who have sex with men, and transgender people. UNAIDS calls for increased domestic and foreign HIV/AIDS funding focusing on those most at risk. As of 2009, an estimated 4.9 million HIV-positive people lived in the region.

To read the UNAIDS statement, click here.