HONG KONG: The city recorded its highest-ever number of HIV infections in a single year, with 435 new cases recorded in 2008, up 5 percent from the previous year, the Department of Health announced yesterday.

It is the highest number of HIV infections since records began in 1984, it said, adding most of the new infections were the result of sexual contact.

Of the new cases, 145 resulted from homosexual relations, 131 from heterosexual contact, 40 from intravenous drug use and three from blood infusion.