Australia to host world's largest AIDS forum

Australia will host the world's largest conference on HIV/AIDS in 2014, official announcement said on Tuesday. More than 25,000 experts from 200 countries are expected to attend the forum, the 20th International AIDS Conference in Melbourne. According to Sharon Lewin, co-chair and professor of medicine at Australia's Monash University, the conference will discuss issues such as treatment issues facing the Asia Pacific region, scientific research, discrimination and government policy. Lewin said there are about five million people infected with HIV in the Asia Pacific region, but only 45 percent of people have access to treatment in low income countries. "The challenge for Asia is that the epidemic is very different in different countries,"she said. "Treatment is completely life transforming. For people with HIV without treatment, the illness is universally fatal,"Lewin added. About 18,000 Australians are infected with HIV/AIDS, which has no cure. The next International AIDS Conference will be held in Washington in July 2012.