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The World Health Organization (WHO) Thursday urged governments to intensify the fight against HIV infection among men who have sex with men and transgender people.

WHO said that unless countries urgently expand access to health services for these key populations, the gains made against the HIV/AIDS virus over the last decade could be jeopardized.

"We need to strengthen our programmes to ensure that these key populations receive the support they need to protect themselves. We need to scale up, improve and sustain comprehensive, effective and stigma-free HIV prevention efforts focusing on, and working with men who have sex with men and transgender people." said WHO director for Western Pacific Dr. Shin Young-soo.

The World AIDS Day 2012 is observed on December 1 with the theme "Getting to Zero: Zero new HIV infections. Zero Discrimination. Zero AIDS-related Deaths.”

The celebration is dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection. AIDShas killed more than 25 million people between 1981 and 2007, and an estimated 33.2 million people worldwide live with HIV as of 2007, making it one of the most destructive epidemics in recorded history.

To prevent the spread of the AIDS virus, WHO said all people in need should have access to early diagnosis and life-saving anti-retroviral treatment; essential health commodities such as male and female condoms, lubricants and clean needles and syringes for effective prevention of HIV transmission; high-quality and stigma-free health-care and prevention services.

Based on the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS 2012 (UNAIDS) Global Report: UNAIDS report on the global AIDS epidemic 2012, the HIV epidemics in Asia and the Pacific remain largely concentrated among people who inject drugs, and men who have sex with men and sex workers.

HIV prevention coverage remains inadequate for men who have sex with men. In the Philippines and Vietnam , the coverage is a low 25 percent, the UNAIDS said.

Although China reported more than 75 % coverage of such programmes, and a survey of Singaporean and Vietnamese men who have sex revealed a high rate of condom use at 75 %, HIV infection among men who have sex with men across the region continues to grow, it said.

UNAIDS added that governments would have to reassess the effectiveness and quality of their existing interventions.

In 2011, some 1.3 million people were living with HIV in the 37 countries and areas of the WHO Western Pacific Region, where 80,000 deaths were attributed to AIDS. The number of people newly infected with HIV declined from 150,000 per year in 2000 to 130,000 in 2011, it said.

In Cambodia , Malaysia and Papua New Guinea , the rate of new HIV infections fell by more than 25 percent between 2001 and 2011, said the UNAIDS.

But in the Philippines , the rate of new HIV infections rose by more than 25 percent per year during the same period, it said.

Globally, some eight million people or 54 percent of those in need, were receiving anti-retroviral therapy in 2011, the UNAIDS said.

But in the Western Pacific, only Cambodia reached more than 80 percent coverage of anti-retroviral therapy. In Papua New Guinea , more than 60 percent of people who needed the therapy were receiving it last year.

WHO said that effective implementation of programmes to halt mother-to-child transmission, however, had resulted in a 36 percent decrease in the number of children born with HIV in the Pacific between 2009 and 2011.

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