GENEVA, Nov 20: The United Nations on Tuesday sharply reduced by about seven million its estimate for the number of people worldwide infected with the AIDS virus, citing a major reassessment of HIV prevalence in India.

Health officials warned against any complacency in the fight against the disease in the light of the latest statistics, stressing the need for vigilance and ever more reliable monitoring mechanisms.

Revised figures in the latest UNAIDS annual report slashed an estimate for total infections this time last year to 32.7 million from 39.5 million cases, the number given in the agency’s 2006 report.

“The single biggest reason for the reduction in global HIV prevalence figures in the past year was the recent revision in India after an intensive reassessment of the epidemic in that country,” UNAIDS said in its report.

Improvements in data collection also resulted in statistics being revised for Angola, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria and Zimbabwe, it added. UNAIDS cautioned against comparing 2007 figures to those of last year in the light of the revisions.

“Reliable public health data are the essential foundation for an effective response,” said Kevin De Cock, head of HIV/AIDS at the World Health Organisation.

“We need to continue investing more in all countries and all aspects of strategic information relating to health,” he added.

The WHO official told journalists it was “probably not likely” that there were any other big countries where there could be a similar “major error” in the estimate of HIV/AIDS cases as happened in India.

The number of people worldwide infected with HIV in 2007 totalled 2.5 million people and 33.2 million are now living with the virus, the report said.

More than two million people died from the incurable disease in 2007. Children under the age of 15 totalled 2.5 million of the total number of those living with the virus, 420,000 of new cases and 330,000 of all AIDS deaths.

Numbers of people living with the virus were levelling out and the percentage of the population affected was now in decline, the report said.

But UNAIDS director of evidence, monitoring and policy Paul De Lay told a press briefing that the fall in numbers should not be taken as a sign that the battle had been won.—AFP