Activists and governments are due to mark World Aids Day today with events drawing attention to the disease and promoting its eradication.
Recent UN figures indicate more women and girls are living with HIV in each region of the world than ever before.
An Indian volunteer carries a red ribbon, the international symbol of AIDS awareness, near a busy street on World AIDS Day in the eastern Indian city of Calcutta today
The steepest increases are in East Asia, followed by Eastern Europe and Central Asia with an estimated 39.4 million people, the highest level of infection to date, living with HIV worldwide.
The World Health Organisation has urged countries to give better access to treatment to women and girls who comprise about 47 percent of the world's HIV/AIDS victims.
Calling for greater public education about risk behaviour and sex, Ms Ann Nolan, director of the Dublin AIDS Alliance has warned, said: "Young women tend to think the pill is going to protect them from HIV. They think, 'I love this person, therefore this person cannot give me AIDS'. That is what we are up against."
Figures show the rate of new infections diagnosed annually in the Republic have risen by 243 per cent since 1998.
In 2003 there were 399 new cases of HIV. Some 55 per cent of them were heterosexuals, 19 per cent were gay men, and 12 per cent were injecting drug users.
More than half were of sub-Saharan African origin, a third were born the Republic and 10 per cent were of unknown origin.