The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will release its long-anticipated revised HIV incidence estimates August 3, Reuters reports (reuters.com, 7/22). The new estimates will be published in The Journal of the American Medical Association.

“These new incidence estimates are based on direct measurement of new HIV infections and will provide the clearest picture to date of incidence (or the number of new HIV infections in a given year),” the CDC said in a statement. “These more precise estimates are possible now only because of breakthrough technology developed by CDC that can distinguish recent from long-standing infections.”

Activists and HIV/AIDS experts have been urging the CDC to release these numbers for months, speculating that HIV incidence was far higher than the current estimate of 1.1 million Americans.

According to the article, Anthony Fauci, MD, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in June that he believed the numbers of new infections had risen from 40,000 to 50,000 a year. However, the CDC denied that Fauci had seen the new estimates.