Drug use & health consequences>>People Who Inject Drugs
People who inject drugs living with HIV
Drug use by injection continues to drive the spread of the HIV epidemic in many countries. The relative risk of acquiring HIV is 14 times higher for those who inject drugs, and even higher for young people and women who inject drugs, than for the general population globally.
An estimated 1.7 million people who inject drugs, 12.1 per cent of the general population, were living with HIV in 2024. This is equivalent of nearly 1 in every 8 people who inject drugs
The highest prevalence of people who inject drugs and were living with HIV were found in Southern Africa, followed by South-West Asia and Eastern Europe.
Nearly one in four PWID living with HIV were found in Eastern Europe.
Globally nearly one in four PWID is a woman. However, women who inject drugs carry a higher burden of health and social consequences: they are 1.2 times more likely than men to be living with HIV.
The vulnerability of women stemming from conventional gender roles and gender power structures and relations may also increase their vulnerability to unsafe sexual and injecting behaviours. Women who inject drugs are likely to have a male intimate partner who initiate them into drug use; they are also likely to ask their male partner to inject them. Women who use drugs, including those who inject, drugs are also vulnerable to gender-based violence and sexual abuse perpetrated both by their intimate partners and other people who use drugs around them, law enforcement officers and drug service providers.
