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HIV/AIDS among African-American women more prevalent than previously believed

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
March 12th, 2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

HIV, the virus that causes AIDS has been found to be far more prevalent in African American women than has previously been believed. In particular, in several areas throughout the continental United States, there are a number "hot spots" where infection among black women is high.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - In a new study carried out by a national team of experts and led by Sally Hodder M.D., from the New Jersey-New Jersey Medical School, found that from a cohort study of 2,099 adult females, the HIV positive rate was 0.24 percent. Eighty-eight percent of the women in this study were African-American. The study's rate is five times higher than the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) estimate for black women.

Hodder presented the findings of the study at the "19th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI)." The study was entitled "HPTN 064 Women's HIV Seroincidence Study (ISIS)," from the HIV Prevention Trials Network.

Findings showed that HIV rates of their sample population were not that entirely removed from those found in sub-Saharan Africa, the Congo has a 0.28 percent infection rate and Kenya, 0.53 percent. Researchers explained that their findings underscore the considerable HIV transmission that currently exists within some U.S. populations, including adult African-American females at risk.

The study focused on six geographical areas in the USA, which are known to have higher HIV rates, in addition to above-average levels of poverty.

"We have known that black women in the U.S. are disproportionately impacted by HIV, however, the magnitude of this disparity in areas hardest hit by the HIV epidemic underscores the gravity of the problem, Hodder says.

Sixty-six percent of all new female HIV infections occur in black women in the U.S. a nation where only 14 percent of U.S. females are African-American. Approximately one quarter of all reported new HIV infections in America are female cases.

The HIV adjusted death rate among African-American adult females is 15 times more than for Caucasian women, the authors reported.

"Despite prevention efforts in the last 30 years, the reality is that we still have ongoing HIV transmission in the US that requires focusing prevention efforts," Hodder says.

Hodder also presented details on 2002-2009 data gathered in Newark, and how the team created a model to predict which interventions are most likely to be successful in controlling the HIV epidemic. Among the things that must be implemented in order to stave off this widening health crisis are:

-- The widening of HIV testing
-- Reducing the time from infection to testing
-- Finding ways of reducing the drop-out rate from treatment programs
-- Better treatments that suppress viral loads among infected patients

A combination of the four interventions, researchers say would be more successful. The proposed model predicts it would reduce HIV infection incidence by 39 percent and death rates by 45.8 percent. It also predicts that if just one approach were pursued, the results would be less than half as effective.
 
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