Today is the 20th anniversary of World AIDS Day, an “annual wake-up call to keep the promise to stop AIDS.”
At the beginning of the AIDS crisis, the disease was called the “gay plague.” In the 1980s, the victims were predominantly white gay men who died within months of their HIV-positive diagnosis.
As AIDS enters its third decade, an HIV-positive diagnosis is no longer an automatic death sentence. The antiretroviral therapy has kept some HIV-infected people alive for nearly 30 years.
People like Phill Wilson, founder and CEO of the Black AIDS Institute, who was one of the speakers at a community forum on the eve of World AIDS Day at the historic Riverside Church.
Wilson said the face of HIV/AIDS has changed:
The AIDS crisis by the numbers:
- African Americans make up 13 percent of the nation’s population but accounted for nearly half (49 percent) of the people living with AIDS.
- AIDS is the leading cause of death among black women aged 25-34.
- Black women represent 67 percent of new AIDS cases among women.
- AIDS is the second leading cause of death among black men between the ages of 35 and 44.
- Between 20,000 and 30,000 blacks become newly infected with HIV every year.
If black America were a country, it would rank 16th in the number of people living with HIV, and be eligible to participate in President Bush’s signature global initiative, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
The rate of HIV infections among African Americans is higher than Botswana, Ethiopia, Guyana, Haiti, Namibia, Rwanda and Vietnam.
Rev. Dr. Calvin O. Butts III, chairman of the National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS, reported on the National Conclave on HIV/AIDS Policy for Black Clergy, which he co-chaired with Bishop T.D. Jakes.
Rev. Butts outlined the black church’s response to the AIDS epidemic. He noted that in the 111th Congress, Rep. Charles B. Rangel will introduce the National HIV/AIDS Elimination Act, which would formally declare HIV/AIDS in the African American community a public health emergency.
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