New Study Shows High Rate of HIV/AIDS In Augusta Area

A new interactive online map shows more than 7 percent of people living in Richmond and Burke counties have the HIV virus.

According to the study's authors at the National Minority Quality Forum, the 13-county East Central Health District has the third highest number of reported AIDS cases in the state.

The new database gives a closer look at Georgia's infection rates because it breaks government records of HIV/AIDS cases down by county. That’s something that state reports don’t do.

Sandra Wimberly is a spokesperson for the East Central Health District which includes Richmond and Burke counties. She says that the fear of being seen at a testing facility might cause some to forgo being tested, especially in tight-knit communities.

"When you have smaller counties with less population and everybody knows everybody….there’s more stigma associated with smaller areas or rural counties."

Officials say that 79 percent of the people who reported having HIV or AIDS are African American. Of the 17-hundred infected men nearly half were infected through sex with men.

National H.I.V. testing day is this Saturday.

Free H.I.V. tests will be available throughout the Augusta area and across the state.

High HIV Rates in South

A new internet data map offers a first-of-its-kind, county-level look at HIV cases in the U.S. and finds the infection rates tend to be highest in the South. It also finds the infection is concentrated in about 20 percent of American counties, with the highest numbers of cases in population centers like New York and California. However, parts of the South appear especially hard-hit by the virus. More than half the 48 counties with the highest rates of the AIDS-causing infection were in Georgia. The map was put together by the National Minority Quality Forum, a nonprofit research organization that has done other disease maps.

(Associated Press)

Elton John Pushes for More AIDS Work

Singer Elton John told an international biotechnology conference that the world's governments and industries are "ignoring reality" when it comes to the prevention and treatment of HIV and AIDS. John said Tuesday the organizations fighting the AIDS epidemic are fighting the stigma of the disease as much as they are the virus itself. He spoke to thousands gathered at the Georgia World Congress Center for the 2009 BIO International Convention. The singer launched the Elton John AIDS Foundation in the United States in 1992 and in the United Kingdom a year later after watching dozens of his friends die of the disease. The foundation has raised more than $150 million to support programs in 55 countries.

(Associated Press)

CDC: gov't underestimating AIDS spread

The number of Americans infected by the AIDS virus each year is much higher than the government has been estimating, U.S. health officials reported, acknowledging that their numbers have understated the level of the epidemic.

Experts in the field, advocates and a former surgeon general called for more aggressive testing and other prevention efforts, noting that spending on preventing HIV has been flat for seven years.

Since AIDS surfaced in 1981, health officials have struggled to estimate how many people are infected each year. It can take a decade or more for an infection to cause symptoms and illness.

"This is the most reliable estimate we‘ve had since the beginning of the epidemic," said Dr. Julie Gerberding, the CDC‘s director. She said other countries may adopt the agency‘s methodology.

The new infection estimate is based on a blood test that for the first time can tell how recently an HIV infection occurred.

The new estimate relies on blood tests from 22 states where health officials have been using a new HIV testing method that can distinguish infections that occurred within the past five months from those that were older.

Yearly estimates allow better recognition of trends in the U.S. epidemic. For example, the new report found that infections are falling among heterosexuals and injection drug users.

But they also lamented the CDC‘s finding that infections continue to increase in gay and bisexual men, who accounted for more than half of HIV infections in 2006. Also, more than a third of those with HIV are younger than 30.

Some advocates say that suggests a need for more prevention efforts, particularly targeting younger gay and bisexual men.

For years, AIDS was considered a terrifying death sentence, and since 1981, more than half a million Americans have died. But medicines that became available in the 1990s turned it into a manageable chronic condition for many Americans, and attention shifted to Africa and other parts of the world.

Last week, President Bush signed a $48 billion global AIDS bill to continue a program that he called "the largest commitment by any nation to combat a single disease in human history."

But some advocates complain that CDC‘s annual spending on HIV prevention in the United States has been held to roughly $700 million since 2001, while costs have risen. (That‘s about 3 percent of what the federal government spends on AIDS; much of the rest is on medicines, health care and research.)

Whether more funding comes or not, the revised estimate clearly is a "wake-up call to scale things up," said Dr. Kevin Fenton, who oversees CDC‘s prevention efforts for HIV/AIDS.

Some said more attention needs to focus on prevention among blacks, who account for nearly half of annual HIV infections, according to the new CDC report.

A recent report by the Black AIDS Institute concluded that if black Americans were their own nation, they would rank 16th in the world in the number of people living with HIV.

"We have been inadequately funding this epidemic all along. We need to step it up," said former U.S. Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher, who is now an administrator at Atlanta‘s Morehouse School of Medicine.

The new estimate has been anticipated for a long time. The CDC began working on the new methods nearly seven years ago.

Late last year, advocates said they had heard the figure was about 55,000 and pressed the CDC to release it. Agency officials declined, saying they were submitting their research for medical journal review.

"These are extremely complicated statistical methods," and CDC officials wanted the work to be thoroughly reviewed by outside experts, Gerberding said. The CDC‘s findings are being published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Until 1992, the number of diagnosed AIDS cases was used to predict how many people were newly infected each year. That method produced an estimate of 40,000 to 80,000. More recently, the CDC focused on infections among men who have sex with men, who account for about half of new HIV diagnoses.
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CDC HIV fact sheets: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/

JAMA: http://jama.ama-assn.org

(The Associated Press)

Click here for more GPB News coverage about the CDC.

Woman with HIV gets 3 years for spitting in face

A woman diagnosed with HIV has been sentenced to three years in prison for spitting in another woman's face and proclaiming "I hope you get AIDS."

The woman, 43-year-old Audrey D. Lewis, pleaded guilty Monday to aggravated assault in a Columbus courtroom.

Police said a 24-year-old went to lock the apartment door of a friend who was being arrested Oct. 3 for simple battery against Lewis. Assistant District Attorney Doug Breault said Lewis approached the woman and the two began to quarrel.

Breault said Tuesday that Lewis will have to serve the full sentence because she has three prior felonies.

Defense attorney Judy Dunlap said the three years was unwarranted. She said she was hoping for about three months.

(The Associated Press)

HIV cases up in the South

HIV cases are on the rise in the South. This according to a new report by the Southern AIDS Coalition. It says federal funding to fight HIV/AIDS focuses on wealthy parts of the country. While the number of AIDS deaths dropped in the nation between 2001 and 2005, it rose in the South. The report says the South has more new HIV cases than any other region, but ranks last in overall funding.

Boost for ailing minority health care

Minority health care in several southwest Georgia counties gets failing marks according to a new report. The 2008 Health Disparities Report (.pdf download) says that while racial and ethnic minorities make up about a third of Georgia's population, they are much more likely to have health problems.

The Office of Minority Health, which put out the report is working to equalize health care access for minority and non-minority populations in Georgia.

Kristal Ammons of the Department of Community Health says Muscogee County's grade was among the lowest statewide:

“...particularly in the overall report card -- they received a grade of 'F' for prenatal care and maternal health outcomes.”

Representatives met with local officials in Columbus on Thursday to discuss ways of improving minority health care.

Ammons says a matrix of poor education, poverty and economic hardship are a big part of the problem, but adds that many other counties received higher ratings.

The group plans to distribute $1.5 million in improvement grants statewide. The funds will also cover other health issues including cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and HIV/AIDS.

The group plans to set up coalitions with local officials and health care providers in Fort Valley, Valdosta and Brunswick, among others statewide.

Click here for more GPB coverage of health issues in Georgia.