National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day: September 27

CDC Announcement: National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day

From U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Source: http://www.thebody.com/content/69161/cdc-announcement-national-gay-mens-hivaids-awarene.html?ap=2009

National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day is observed each year on September 27 to focus on the continuing effects of the human immunodeficiency virus infection (HIV) and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) on gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (MSM) in the United States. By the end of 2009, more than 592,000 MSM were living with HIV infection, 52% of persons living with HIV infection in the United States.¹

Although MSM represent approximately 2% of the U.S. population,² in 2009, they accounted for 64% of all new HIV infections (including MSM who also were injection drug users [3% of new infections]). During 2006-2009, the estimated number of new HIV infections among MSM was stable overall, but increased approximately 34% among MSM aged 13-29 years, and approximately 48% in black or African American MSM in that age group. In 2009, approximately 22% of new infections among MSM were among young black or African American MSM, the highest number of new infections among any age or race/ethnicity group of MSM.³

CDC supports a range of efforts to reduce HIV infection among MSM. These include HIV prevention services to reduce the risk for acquiring and transmitting HIV, diagnosis of HIV infection, and linkage of MSM with HIV infection to treatment, including programs designed specifically for young black or African American MSM. Additional information about these efforts is available at www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/msm. Additional information about National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day is available at www.cdc.gov/features/ngmhaad.

References

1. CDC. Monitoring selected national HIV prevention and care objectives by using HIV surveillance data — United States and 6 U.S. dependent areas — 2010. HIV Surveillance Supplemental Report 2012;17(No. 3, part A).
2. Purcell DW, Johnson C, Lansky A, et al. Calculating HIV and syphilis rates for risk groups: estimating the national population size of MSM. Presented at the 2010 National STD Prevention Conference, Atlanta, GA; March 10, 2010.
3. Prejean J, Song R, Hernandez A, et al. Estimated HIV incidence in the United States, 2006-2009. PLoS ONE 2011; 6(8):1-13.

6 Misconceptions Young People Have About HIV/AIDS

Hydeia Broadbent Sets it Straight

BY TOMIKA ANDERSON

Reposted to showcase one of our newest spokes-people and proud partnerships: Hydeia Broadbent

Hydeia Broadbent has been living with HIV her entire life, but as she told Black Enterprise yesterday, that has not been a death sentence.  In fact, the 26-year-old AIDS activist has been a very vocal spokeswoman for awareness about the disease, which has reached epidemic proportions in the African American community. Black people account for 50 percent of all new HIV diagnoses in this country but only 12 percent of the U.S. population. Despite her work and increased public information about HIV/AIDS, Broadbent still encounters people who have outdated misconceptions about the disease.   It’s important to her that she set some records straight.

1. LOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING You can’t look at someone and tell they have HIV. Often there aren’t any physical symptoms. If you’re sexually active you should go get tested every six months. If you’re in a relationship with someone, go get tested together. If you can’t [get them to go with you] you shouldn’t be sleeping with him or her.

2. HIV/AIDS DOES NOT DISCRIMINATE A lot of young people still associate HIV/AIDS as a gay man’s disease. It’s not. It can affect anyone at any time. There is a lot of hype over “men on the down low” spreading this disease in our community but that’s not how most of our girls/women are becoming infected. They’re mostly being infected by heterosexual men who have more than one sex partner that we may or may not know about. The H in HIV stands for human, which means anyone is at risk if they don’t protect themselves from being infected.

3. MEDICINE HELPS BUT THERE IS STILL NO CURE AIDS may no longer be a death sentence because of advancements in medicine but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t protect yourselves. Among other things, it’s a very expensive disease to live with. You don’t just pay for the medicine—you pay to see a doctor and to get blood work done. And it’s not guaranteed your state or the federal government will pay for any of this because of widespread funding cuts. While people are living longer, 18,000 die each year due to complications with AIDS, according to the CDC.

4. REAL LIFE IS NOT LIKE A RAP VIDEO Young people trying to emulate the rapper/hip-hop lifestyle is really hurting us. Kids want to live these glorified experiences out in real life—sleeping with lots of people, getting high on drugs and spending time in jail—but we’re not talking about the consequences of these actions. Being clouded by drugs and alcohol impairs your judgment. Having multiple sex partners increases your risk for infection.

5. HIV/AIDS IS NOT THE END OF YOUR SOCIAL LIFE It is possible to have a relationship with someone who is infected. You just need to know what’s safe and how to protect yourself.

6. HAVING HEALTHY KIDS IS STILL AN OPTION You can also have children if you are HIV positive. There are ways to protect your unborn child from being born with the disease. Consult your doctor to find out more.

AIDS Economics

By Alina Oswald

Alina Oswald is a freelance writer/photographer and author living in the NYC area.

Money doesn’t bring happiness. Money, alone, cannot solve the world’s AIDS crisis. Money is not the sole solution to a life-and-death kind of problem that AIDS still is. Yet, without money, without the appropriate funds, all the AIDS service organizations, all the non-profits serving the AIDS community, will be forced to close their doors leaving many of those living with the virus and depending on their help, in limbo.

With the recent budget cuts overtaking pretty much every aspect of our lives, this kind is scenario becomes more of a reality than just a hypothesis. Conform the National Minority AIDS Council, for the last five months the federal government has operated on the continuing resolution that kept this year’s budgets at last year’s levels. Therefore, for the same five months, agencies have planned their budgets on the assumptions that this year’s budget would be approximately the same with the previous year’s one. Yet, the House Appropriation Committee had planned on even deeper cuts for agencies which are critical to people living with HIV/AIDS. The proposed cuts include:

$1.3 billion dollars from Community Health Centers
$1.57 billion dollars from the National Institute of Health
$923 million from the Center of Disease Control and Prevention
$327 million from Family Planning
$280 million from Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration

These “draconian cuts,” as the National Minority AIDS Council’s website calls the massive cuts, leave agencies with only seven months to react. That means that the agencies will feel a double effect of the cuts, having only half of the time (half a year) to react. We can only wonder what will happen if they run out of time. We can only wonder what will be next.

The AIDS economics are tough to start with. Add to that the current overall economic situation and you have some kind of Perfect Storm…

 

**For more from Alina Oswald, visit UNCONVENTIONAL – her blog about unconventional, inconvenient and sometimes taboo topics that populate human reality and imagination.