December 1 is World AIDS Day, reminding us that the fight against the AIDS pandemic is far from over. More than 36 million people have died since it emerged in the early 1980s. Today, 35.3 million people around the world are living with the virus. 73,000 Canadians are currently HIV positive up from 49,000 in 2001, according to statistics from the Canadian Foundation for AIDS Research (CanFAR).