The ratio of blood donors who tested positive for HIV in 2000 hit its highest level since the national government started compiling figures in 1986, according to a recently published report.
Sixty-seven out of 5.878 million people who donated blood in 2000 were HIV positive, a ratio of 1.14 per 100,000, the report shows.
The report, based on preliminary data on blood donations last year, was presented on Tuesday to an AIDS panel of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry.
The ratio of HIV-positive donors has been increasing and is now more than three times higher than 10 years ago, although the number of blood donations was at its lowest last year.
The ratio stood at 1.026 per 100,000 donors in 1999.
Four of the 67 positive donors last year were women.
In November and December, 39 people were newly reported to have developed AIDS and 87 were found to have been infected with HIV, which causes AIDS.
Five people died from AIDS in the same period, raising the cumulative total of deaths from AIDS to 1,205 in Japan, the panel was told.
The panel formerly met six times a year but will meet four times a year starting this year, ministry officials said.