The Aids Epidemiology Group looked at the prevalence of HIV amongst people using sexual health clinics throughout the country.
Spokesman Nigel Dickson says there has been an increase in the number of both men and women who have become infected.
He says the rise was particularly steep between 2000 and 2005.
Dickson says while HIV infection remains concentrated amongst gay men, people from every sexual preference group are now having HIV tests.
In fact, a both reassuring and troubling aspect of the research is that an increasing number of New Zealanders are going for HIV tests.
Dickson says the number of gay men going to clinics in Auckland and Christchurch is up by about seven per cent in the past decade.
He says the numbers could reflect more gay men in the population or that their behaviour is becoming more risky, and so they are going for more checks.
2008 marks the 20th anniversary of World AIDS Day - at its inception, it had only recently been acknowledged as an illness that threatened everyone, not just the gay community. 33 million people are now estimated to be living with HIV and AIDS, with 370,000 of those believed to be children.
