The number of people living with HIV has come to an estimated all-time record of 39.4 million worldwide, two UN agencies said in an annual report released Tuesday.

The death toll from the virus is expected to 3.1 million this year, according to the AIDS Epidemic Update 2004 report released by the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS and the World Health Organization.

The report stressed the need for measures to protect women from selling sex for money or daily necessities, a practice it says is a major source of infection.

Women constitute about a half of the estimated 37.2 million adults with HIV, the report said.

About 25.4 million, or nearly two-thirds of the total number of infected people, are in sub-Saharan Africa, it said.

About 75 percent of those infected there and aged from 15 to 24 are women, according to the report.

The rate of increase is especially large in East Asia, with a jump of 50 percent, while the rate was 40 percent in Eastern and Central Europe due to increases in Ukraine and Russia.

The report revised downward the number of infections in its 2002 report from 42 million to 36.6 million and in the 2003 report from 40 million to 38.1 million.