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World AIDS Day 2014
Where Do We Stand In The Fight?

World AIDS Day was December 1st and has been observed since 1988. It's a day to honor and remember those who have passed but it's also a time to see where we stand in the fight.

The federal government, in July of 2010 announced their National HIV/AIDS Strategy For The United States. The strategy was supposed to be in effect and continue until 2015. The "Vision" or goal of the strategy are as follows:

“The United States will become a place where new HIV infections are rare and when they do occur, every person, regardless of age, gender, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity or socio-economic circumstance, will have unfettered access to high quality, life-extending care, free from stigma and discrimination."

To achieve the above goal,the strategy laid out this roadmap:

-Reduce New HIV Infections

• Intensify HIV prevention efforts in communities where HIV is most heavily concentrated.

• Expand targeted efforts to prevent HIV infection using a combination of effective, evidence-based approaches.

• Educate all Americans about the threat of HIV and how to prevent it.

-Increase Access to Care and Improve Health Outcomes for People Living with HIV

• Establish a seamless system to immediately link people to continuous and coordinated quality care when they are diagnosed with HIV.

• Take deliberate steps to increase the number and diversity of available providers of clinical care and related services for people living with HIV.

• Support people living with HIV with co-occurring health conditions and those who have challenges meeting their basic needs, such as housing.

-Reducing HIV-Related Health Disparities

• Reduce HIV-related mortality in communities at high risk for HIV infection.

• Adopt community-level approaches to reduce HIV infection in high-risk communities.

• Reduce stigma and discrimination against people living with HIV.

-Achieve a More Coordinated National Response to the HIV Epidemic in the United States

Increase the coordination of HIV programs across the Federal government and between federal agencies and state, territorial, tribal, and local governments.

• Develop improved mechanisms to monitor and report on progress toward achieving national goals.

So with four years down and one to go left on the strategy, where are we?

Of course, some of the goals are hard to quantify but here are some facts released by the CDC just last month, in November of 2014:

Since the height of the epidemic in the mid-1980s, the annual number of new HIV infections in the United States has been reduced by more than two-thirds, from roughly 130,000 to approximately 50,000 annually. As a result of treatment advances since the late 1990s, the number of people living with HIV has increased dramatically. Yet, despite increasing HIV prevalence and more opportunities for HIV transmission, the number of new infections has been relatively stable since the mid-1990s.

CDC estimates that 1.2 million people in the United States are living with HIV – and nearly one in seven of those are not aware that they are infected. People who are HIV positive and unaware are at greatest risk of contributing to the growth of new infections. One way to reduce this is to be tested and recommend to others you think are at risk to be tested. The CDC has a locator and app available for testing sites and it can be accessed at http://aids.gov/locator/.

Increased access to care has been one of the major achievements with the Affordable Care Act (ACA/Obamacare) being put in place. When the National HIV/AIDS Strategy was put forth in 2010, the ACA was not in place and while there are still hurdles to access to care, the ACA has made insurance and therefore access available to many who were not covered and shut-out prior to the act becoming law.

There are still disparities with regard to HIV in high-risk communities. The CDC estimates that gay and bisexual men, injection drug users, transgender persons as well as African Americans and Latinos are most disproportionately affected by HIV.

There are other socioeconomic factors that help contribute to the disparity in some affected communities which the CDC lists as:

-Poverty limiting access to healthcare
-Discrimination, stigma and homophobia
-Prevalence of HIV and other STDs ina community
-Higher rates of undiagnosed/untreated STDs
-Higher rates of incarceration amongmen
-Language barriers and concerns about immigration status

So there has definitely been some strides made toward accomplishing the National HIV/AIDS Strategy but much more needs to be done especially in the areas of education, prevention, testing and fighting the stigma of HIV.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


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