El Caribe newspaper reports that 2.2%, or 185,000 persons living in the DR are AIDS carriers. The numbers were reported in the opening speech given by Martha Butler, who will head the newly opened Dirección General de Control de Infecciones de Transmisión Sexual y Sida (DIGECITSS), a government organization that seeks to put a stop to the advance of AIDS in the DR. According to the same 1999 statistics, the by 2005, 2.4% of the population, or 240,000 residents, could be affected by AIDS in 2005, unless major programs are implemented to stop the spreading of the disease. According to Dr. Ernesto Castellanos, of the Panamerican Health Organization, the new AIDS victims are young and poor. The World Bank estimates that the expansion of the AIDS virus in the DR will represent economic losses of 0.8%-1.4% of the Gross Domestic Product, or about one percentage point of the growth of the country in years to come. In 1999 there were 100 new cases of AIDS in children, up from 55 in 1995, 10 in 1990 and one in 1985. Some 4,000 were diagnosed to have died of AIDS in 1999. Martha Butler, of the Digecitss, said that by 2005, 44% of all deaths of persons 14 to 49 years old will be of persons infected with AIDS. The Dominican government has carried out several education programs, but much more is said to be necessary in order to put a stop to the spread of the disease.
