US lifts ban on travellers with AIDS

The United States has lifted a 22-year ban preventing anyone with HIV or AIDS from entering the country.

President Barack Obama says the measure was not compatible with American ambitions of becoming a world leader in the fight against the disease.

The US introduced its immigration ban on people with HIV and AIDS at the height of a global panic at the end of the 1980s.

Only 11 other countries excluded anyone with the condition, including Libya and Saudi Arabia.

Improving treatment and evolving public understanding of AIDS have combined to make the lifting of the ban possible.

An international AIDS summit will be held in the United States in 2012.

The summit was previously impossible to be held there because the ban would have prevented anyone with the condition from attending.