A group of local activists and ministers are pushing for President Barack Obama to declare HIV/AIDS a public health emergency in African-American communities. NY1's Cheryl Wills filed the following report.
Former Manhattan Borough President C. Virginia Fields is no longer in the political arena, but she finds herself at the center of a public health crisis. She is the president of the National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS and says the virus is killing black Americans at an alarming rate.
"I wanted to be a part of seeing how we can bring more awareness and attention as to what is happening in the black community, help move people from this state of complacency of believing that it's no longer a problem, they no longer have to be concerned," said Fields.
But the latest Centers for Disease Control statistics are of great concern to many.
African-Americans account for 45 percent, almost half, of new HIV infections. HIV related deaths are also highest among blacks and is the fourth leading cause of death for black men and third for black women.
With African-Americans making up 50 percent of al new infections, HIV/AIDS is increasingly becoming a "Black disease"
It is the health crisis that Black America has yet to fully comprehend and come to grips with. Festering beneath a shroud of secrecy and facilitated by a complex web of lies, shame and misinformation, it is an epidemic that is placing whole communities in jeopardy. Even in the face of tremendous advances in detection and treatment, even with the mountains of information disseminated about protection and prevention, the spread of HIV/AIDS has become a public health emergency among African-Americans.
Consider these statistics: For Blacks age 25-44, HIV/AIDS was the leading cause of death in 1998. Black women account for about 64 percent of AIDS cases reported among women. Black children under the age of 13 represent almost two-thirds of all reported pediatric HIV cases in the United States.
To date, over 225,000 African Americans have died of AIDS - nearly 40% of total deaths - and of the more than 1 million people living with HIV in the United States of America today, around half are black. And yet, as a racial group, African Americans represent just 13% of the US population. The estimated lifetime risk of becoming infected with HIV is 1 in 16 for black males, and 1 in 30 for black females, a far higher risk than for white males (1 in 104) and white females (1 in 588).1 In Washington D.C, which has the nation’s highest district HIV prevalence (3%), 76 % of those infected are African American.
Is Keisha....An specie nearing extinction??
