HIV Rate Up 12 Percent Among Young Gay Men

[Newsjock]

Source: Washington Post

The number of young homosexual men being newly diagnosed with HIV infection is rising by 12 percent a year, with the steepest upward trend in young black men, according to a new report.

The double-digit increase in young gay men is about 10 times higher than in the homosexual community overall, where the number of new infections is going up about 1.5 percent a year.

The report, released yesterday by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, appears to confirm impressions that a "second-wave" AIDS epidemic is underway in gay America.

... The study found that homosexual men were the only risk group in which the number of new infections rose annually from 2001 through 2006.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/26/AR2008062603521.html?hpid=moreheadlines

[Bluenorthwest]

1. See y'all

look at this quote for that article:

In the youngest age bracket, the yearly rise averaged 8 percent among Hispanics, 9 percent among whites and 15 percent among blacks.

That is why I spoke up about McClurkin and the use of all of that bull in the Primary campaign. I did not speak for me, but for that 15%, and for the rest of the youth. McClurkin and his ilk can not harm the likes of me, but they make for ignorance and fear for younger people, and lending legitimacy to these people is deadly.
Inclusion and acceptance, education and empowerment, those are the things that save lives. Anything else is the opposite of saving a life.
And stats like that have been the same for decades. Which is why many Gospel performers have been practicing inclusion and acceptance, speading education and empowerment, openly and with love, for decades. Then there are the others.
So yeah, all the faux outrage over McClurkin. 15%. Own that.

[Honeycombe8]

3. The people who unfortunately got that horrible disease...must own the responsibility

for getting it, don't you think?

Everyone knows the basics of what to do and not do. If A doesn't happen, then B results. "B" being HIV.

Young people think they are invincible, unfortunately.

I don't know why they separate the numbers out by race, in the first place. What's the point of that? Why not separate it out by income? Or by eye color? Or height? What difference does the race make?

[OneBlueDotBama]

4. Why Profile

It's a tool for those in the harm reduction biz used to identify groups at risk. In other words, they can spend their time and resources aimed at specific targets, rather than spending their time preaching to let's say, residents of a retirement home.

[XemaSab]

15. What difference does race make?

The sad fact is that race matters in this country.

If you're a young black man, you're more likely to be uneducated, to go to jail, to live your live in a cycle of poverty... Racism does not discriminate between young gay black men and young straight black men. But, as poster 1 pointed out, there's a lot of homophobia within the black community, and young gay black men are less likely to be open about their sexuality. This breeds a culture of anonymous hook-ups and general denial about sexual orientation. This leads to unsafe sex. :shrug:

[LostinVA]

20. Yep, living on the DL causes a lot of problems

It's one of the reasons why HIV rates are high amongst black women.

[alcibiades_mystery]

23. "What difference does the race make?"

Are you fucking stupid or something?

[seriousstan]

2. Once again, they are invincible. Every season, turn, turn, turn.

[AccessGranted]

5. Oh, they're gonna twist this and have a field day

AIDs and Black males in the same article? Oh boy, I can hear the comments now. People will see that and not read the rest of the article that says:

"Previous studies have found that gay black men on average have fewer sex partners, are less likely to use drugs and are no more likely to have unprotected intercourse than gay white men. Consequently, their higher rate of infection does not appear to arise from riskier behavior. Instead, it reflects the higher prevalence of HIV -- as well as syphilis and gonorrhea, which increase a person's susceptibility to HIV -- in the black population."

Whew. Like young Black males are not always stereotyped enough. Damn.

[GOPNotForMe]

11. Good (and sad) point.

[BlueIris]

13. Yeah, no kidding. READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE, please, DUers.

People I know don't want to believe horrible stereotypes about anyone.

[XemaSab]

16. But why is there a greater prevalence of HIV in the black population to begin with?

:shrug:

Answer: racism and homophobia.

[Xenotime]

6. Why haven't they found a cure for this disease?

[Spouting Horn]

7. That's a good question

considering the amount of tax money (especially in proportion to other diseases) that has been spent.

[Zuiderelle]

8. Huh? You think spending on HIV research has been higher than other disease research?

Where do you get that idea?

[Spouting Horn]

9. In total dollars, no

but the rate based on prevalence, yes, is higher for HIV than all others.

Sorry for the confusion.

[Zuiderelle]

19. Um, again... WHAT? As in What the fuck?

Sorry for your confusion, Mr. Horn. Based on the rate of prevalence, or the per capita rate per year, or the fact that it's been an epidemic worldwide for nearly three decades, we have certainly NOT spent anything NEAR what we have spent to find cures for other diseases.

You need to do some research.

[TheWraith]

21. Depends on how you limit the scope.

I don't know about other countries, but the US has spent something like $180k in research for every HIV death in the US. That's about 18 times the dollars per capita rate of cancer. Now averaged out among ALL patients/deaths everywhere, it may not be on top, but wouldn't be surprised if it were. Really, besides cancer how many other major disease-cure projects are we running, globally?

[LostinVA]

22. Is this "Opposite Day on DU"or something???

One of THE most ignorants posts on HIV/AIDS I have EVER seen on the DU... and that's saying alot.

[BigDaddy44]

10. Why haven't they found a cure for cancer?

Or for Alzheimers? Or for Lou Gehrigs disease? Because its difficult (and potentially impossible)

[noonwitch]

14. The fact that so many people with HIV are living longer than in the 80s

shows that much of the research has paid off. They have found ways to slow the progression, maybe even stop HIV from becoming the active disease.

In the vast majority of cases, pregnant mothers with HIV no longer pass it on to their babies, if they get total prenatal care.

It's too bad Salk died when he did. I am convinced he was onto something with his research into a vaccine-basically because he had a good idea where the virus came from (sick monkeys used to produce polio vaccines). But he was working on AIDS research until he died.

[Crowman1979]

12. The main culprits to this surge are.

Diverting acutal sex education to abstinence programs, crystal meth and rave drugs. Those are just my assumptions.

[Igel]

17. Better data here.

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5725a2.htm?s_cid=mm5725a2_e contains a brief write-up, more than the WaPo had. Can't find the formal report, I assume it's somewhere on the CDC site.

The write-up links to figures with more data: rather than just rates and change in rates, it also looks at populations and trends.

[rainbow4321]

18. Leading cause of death for black women (including African American women) aged 25–34 years.

I went to an HIV/AIDS lecture this week and was stunned to see this stat.

Not that the M$M will ever cover it. Seems like they only report on HIV/AIDS in the US if there is some outrageous element to the story.



http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/women/resources/factsheets/women.htm

Early in the epidemic, HIV infection and AIDS were diagnosed for relatively few women and female adolescents (although we know now that many women were infected with HIV through injection drug use but that their infections were not diagnosed) <1>. Today, women account for more than one quarter of all new HIV/AIDS diagnoses. Women of color are especially affected by HIV infection and AIDS. In 2004 (the most recent year for which data are available), HIV infection was

the leading cause of death for black women (including African American women) aged 25–34 years.
the 3rd leading cause of death for black women aged 35–44 years.
the 4th leading cause of death for black women aged 45–54 years.
the 4th leading cause of death for Hispanic women aged 35–44 years.