Some 8,500 children aged 15 years downward in Vietnam are now living with HIV/AIDS, and nearly 0.4 percent of local pregnant women have HIV, Vietnam News Agency reported Tuesday.

Around 22,000 Vietnamese children are now orphans because their parents have died due to AIDS. Every year, Vietnam has over 2 million pregnant women, 0.39 percent of whom are infected with HIV. The mother-to-child transmission rate is 30-40 percent, the report said.

Vietnam has annually detected 12,000-15,000 HIV infections in recent years. It spotted 13,731 cases of HIV infections in 2005, raising the total number to 104,111 by the end of the year.

Of the local people infected with HIV virus, 17,289 have been AIDS patients. Over 10,000 patients have died due to AIDS.

Source: Xinhua