4. HIV
Nowadays, the deadliest virus of all may be HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). “It is still the one that is the biggest killer,” said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and spokesman for the Infectious Disease Society of America. An estimated 32 million people have died from HIV since the disease was first recognized in the early 1980s. “The infectious disease that takes the biggest toll on mankind right now is HIV,” Adalja said.
Really strong antiviral drugs have made it possible for people who were diagnosed with HIV to live for years with the disease. However, HIV continues to devastate many low and middle income countries, where 95 percent of new HIV infections occur. Nearly 1 in every 25 adults within the WHO African region is HIV positive, accounting for more than two-thirds of the people living with HIV worldwide.
