The U.S. government recommended near-universal testing for the AIDS virus on Thursday, saying too many people are missed by the current practice of focusing on people who seem to be at high risk.

Nearly everyone aged from 13 to 64 would be screened under the new proposals issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Pregnant women would get extra screening to help ensure they do not pass the virus on to their baby.

The human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS infects more than 1 million people in the United States and the CDC estimates that 40,000 people become newly infected every year.

But many do not know it because HIV causes mild symptoms at first, quietly destroying the immune system over time.

"We urgently need new approaches to reach the quarter-million Americans with HIV who do not realize they are infected," said CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding. "People with HIV have a right to know that they are infected so they can seek treatment and take steps to protect themselves and their partners."

AIDS is incurable, and infected people risk passing it to sex partners, to their babies and in blood or shared needles. A cocktail of drugs, now available in once- or twice-a-day single pills, can keep patients healthy, and patients who use condoms reduce their risk of passing it along.

Current guidelines call for people considered at high risk to get tested for the virus. But Dr. Bernard Branson, who is in charge of laboratory diagnostics at CDC, said doctors were not always good at guessing who might be at high risk. And people are often reluctant to admit to high-risk behavior, such as drug use or anal sex, even to their doctors.

"Our goal is to ensure that everyone who receives medical care also has the opportunity to learn if they are infected with HIV," said Dr. Kevin Fenton, Director of CDC's National Center for HIV, STD and TB Prevention.

MAKING TESTING EASIER

"These new recommendations will make routine HIV screening feasible in busy medical settings where it previously was impractical. Making the HIV test a normal part of care for all Americans is also an important step toward removing the stigma still associated with testing."

Branson said regularly testing teenagers would help make them start thinking about AIDS early, before they begin having sex.

"Our data show that too many young people acquire HIV infection at relatively young ages, oftentimes with very early partners," Branson told reporters.

The CDC estimates that between 16 million and 22 million HIV tests are conducted in the United States every year.

AIDS experts welcomed the new recommendations, with some cautions. The American Academy of HIV Medicine said it was important to allow patients to opt out of the test easily, and to make sure they knew what it meant.

"We fear that the CDC's recommendations will lead to clinicians simply telling the patient he or she will receive a test," the group's Dr. Michelle Roland said in a statement.

Dr. Donna Futterman, head of the Adolescent AIDS Program at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx in New York, said one study showed that 80 percent of young men who had sex with other men did not know when they were HIV infected.

"We are hoping that this new call for universal testing will reduce some of the stigma," Futterman said in a telephone interview. "We don't have a medical cure for HIV, we don't have a vaccine for HIV, but we certainly can find and link to care all who have it."

African television and radio stations are planning an on-air campaign to build hope in the face of the AIDS pandemic, in a bid to raise spirits on the worst-hit continent where millions have died from the disease.

The aim is to restore confidence in young people who have developed a defeatist attitude toward a disease that kills 2 million people annually in sub-Saharan Africa, organizers said on Friday.

"People in Africa are rather worn out by continuous (negative) AIDS messaging," said Solly Mokoetle, chief operating officer of the South African Broadcasting Corporation, at a media briefing in Johannesburg.

The African Broadcast Media Partnership Against HIV/AIDS joins 37 major private and public broadcasters from across the continent in one the world's most ambitious communications efforts, hitting airwaves in 24 AIDS-ravaged nations from Ethiopia to Namibia.

organizers hope to raise public awareness of how to stop and reverse the spread of AIDS and to inform those already infected that they can lead normal lives.

The thrust is to motivate youth to make choices that reduce their risk of contracting the HIV virus, allowing them to live full and rewarding lives.

Under the initiative, television and radio stations have agreed to dedicate a minimum of five percent of airtime to HIV/AIDS programming, the equivalent of about one hour each day.

"It's an unprecedented amount for a single issue," said Diaho.

The next phase of the campaign will launch on World AIDS Day, December 1, with a slick two-minute public service advertisement that will air simultaneously across the continent.

The spot shows young people inspired to follow their dreams to become soccer stars or runway models and features such African icons as anti-apartheid hero Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Local media outlets will next year be trained to heighten AIDS awareness by integrating the subject matter into prime time slots, including soap operas, documentaries and sitcoms.

While South Africa's media landscape is one of the most liveliest on the continent, some broadcasting outlets in Africa are state-run and the government controls the content.

organizers vowed to resist state-meddling that could muddle their positive message of a "HIV-free generation" through behavioral change such as using condoms when engaging in sex or having one sexual partner.

"It won't be muzzled," said Yaw Oswusu Addo, director general of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation. "No government today can keep this problem under the carpet."

The multi-million dollar five-year project is financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Kaiser Family Foundation, the Nelson Mandela Foundation and Coca-Cola Africa Foundation.

Sub-saharan Africa has just over 10 per cent of the world's population but is where 60 per cent HIV-positive patients live -- about 26 million.

A non-profit organisation has set up a school in India for children infected with HIV/AIDS and barred from other institutions, an official said.

"All the seven orphans and children who have only one parent were turned down by other schools," said Jyotish Joseph, director of Karunalayam, the organisation which started the school in Andhra Pradesh state.

"We teach them local and English alphabets, mathematics and also take care of their medical needs," Joseph told AFP. "The idea is to give them a lively and happy atmosphere."

The school in southern Warrangal district, which started operations last week, is being staffed by a HIV/AIDS counsellor, a teacher and a nurse.

Before the school was launched, the children had been accommodated with adults at the 40-bed center run by the organisation with the help of government funds.

"The decision to start a school was taken as we felt that if we put children along with adults there were more chances of abuse. Also it demoralises them," Joseph said. "But the main purpose is to give them education."

"Here the concept is of exclusive care. In some schools HIV-positive kids are pushed around by other children and looked down upon. Others deny them admission. They face no such problems in our school," he said.

Two years ago parents of more than 400 children in India's most literate state of Kerala threatened to pull their children out of classes if two HIV-positive kids were admitted to a government-funded school.

"In India there is a lack of awareness about HIV/AIDS among teachers and parents. There needs to be more education," Joseph said. "We plan to take in more children maybe 25 initially and open more such schools in other regions."

India outstripped South Africa as the country with the largest number of HIV/AIDS infections last year. India has 5.7 million people living with AIDS against South Africa's 5.5 million.