500,000 could have HIV in PNG by 2025

More than half a million people on Australia's northern doorstep could be HIV-positive within 20 years unless big steps are taken to fight Papua New Guinea's AIDS epidemic.

Annmaree O'Keeffe, Australia's representative for HIV/AIDS, has presented the dire prediction at PNG's first national summit on HIV prevention in Port Moresby.

She said that a high-intervention strategy, however, could see that infection level drop to around 200,000 people.

She described the next five years as critical.

Heterosexual transmission is the main driver of PNG's epidemic with reported HIV cases at more than 12,000 last year.

Around two per cent of the population is estimated to be HIV-positive but some analysts believe the level is already much higher.

Prime Minister Michael Somare said Papua New Guineans must change their negative attitudes about HIV/AIDS and people living with HIV even in the remotest communities.

"The epidemic has entrenched itself with infections now in all provinces and especially among our youthful population in their productive years," he said.

Australia is providing 24 million kina ($A11.15 million) a year over five years to help PNG to turn the tide of the epidemic.

Dr Jacqueline Badcock of the United Nations Development Program said young women, particularly between the ages of 15 and 29, were twice as likely to be infected than young men of a comparable age.

"Maybe we have the potential to lose the women of Papua New Guinea if we do not take drastic steps to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS."

The conference heard that women in PNG tended to stay faithful in relationships, but their menfolk too often had multiple sexual partners and in so doing, helped spread HIV/AIDS.

Badcock said the epidemic was concentrated in urban centres and economic enclaves such as mine sites but had reached every province and was appearing in the remotest parts of PNG.