Spreading The Word

AIDS activists Friday brandished symbols of hope and held religious services, candlelight vigils and concerts to mark the 13th annual World AIDS Day.

Commemorative flowers, quilts and candles joined with brasher attention-grabbing efforts as activists organized condom convoys and smashed walls to raise awareness of AIDS and HIV.

They warn that the disease continues to devastate sub-Saharan Africa and is finding new ground amid the struggling economies of the former Soviet Union. Infection rates are also are climbing again in developed western countries as many people lose a sense of urgency about the disease.

According to a U.N. report issued this week, 36.1 million people are living with HIV/AIDS worldwide, 5.3 million of whom were infected in the last year. It is expected that 3 million people will die from AIDS this year, 80 percent of them in Africa.

President Clinton visited an AIDS clinic in Washington Friday and addressed a World AIDS Day summit at Howard University. He said the world must overcome both silence and stigma about the disease.

"Prevention is the most effective tool in our arsenal," said Mr. Clinton. "No matter the cultural or religious factors to overcome, families must talk about the facts of life before too many more learn the facts of death."

He added that it is time to recognize AIDS as "an international security crisis." The president said doctors, researchers and activists on the front line of the AIDS battle should be proud of the fact that AIDS death rate in the United States has fallen to its lowest levels since 1987.

But he cautioned that "we must be humbled by how very far we all have to go, especially around the world. Today's reality is much worse than the worst-case scenario of just 10 years ago."

More than 700,000 Americans have been diagnosed with AIDS since the epidemic began in 1981, and 420,000 have died and while AIDS deaths in the U.S. have declined by more than 70 percent in the past five years, 40,000 Americans contract HIV virus each year. Half of those new infections occur among people age 25 and younger.

President Clinton Friday unveiled a strategic plan by the National Institutes of Health for international AIDS research and establishing new ways to pursue AIDS funding and research in more than 50 countries. He also urged Congress to provide money for AIDS prevention and treatment programs so all HIV-positive Americans, regardless of income, can have access to the latest, most powerful medications.

"Marrying our money to our intentions is a formula for real progress in the United States," said the president. "It is a formula, in other words, for people living longer and better lives."

Activists around the world used a vast range of media to convey the World Aids Day message.

MTV is doing its part with Staying Alive, a 30-minute documentary on HIV/AIDS hosted by singer Ricky Martin, who says there's "still a lot of work to be done to raise awareness around the world."

Britain's National AIDS Trust produced leaflets and a Web site urging people to "Make a Difference." In London, pop star Robbie Williams used a 50-ton crane to smash a wall - emblazoned "Break the Silence on HIV/AIDS" - at an abandoned factory.

Reuters Evelina Andova, age 13, is wholeheartedly behind the World AIDS Day campaign in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Cartoon leaflets and condoms were distributed in Athens' main Syntagma Square, while in Vietnam 11 buses decorated with condoms roamed around Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City distributing condoms and AIDS-awareness pamphlets.

Billboards in the Netherlands encouraged young people to have safe sex. "STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) are available everywhere!" one poster read. Smaller print below added: "Condoms too."

In Colombo, Sri Lanka, leaflets and red AIDS ribbons were distributed at popular youth hangouts and shopping centers.

South Africa has one of the world's highest HIV infection rates and former president Nelson Mandela encouraged greater openness about the disease.

Lectures and publicity campaigns targeted the disease in Russia where it once was widely regarded as a symptom of Western degeneracy.

AIDS has reached crisis proportions in China where officials handed out condoms and newspapers carried touching articles about AIDS victims in a campaign to combat public ignorance.

"Condom Men" in Bangkok, Thailand, wore green and orange fluorescent costumes shaped like condoms and sought contributions from commuters at train and bus stations. The money will be used to buy baby formula for infants born to HIV-infected mothers.

CBS Worldwide Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report