[LINK] "AIDS campaigners say pandemic has finally reached tipping point"

[rfmcdonald]

This Al Jazeera report about the spread of HIV/AIDS in the South of the United States is worrying, and distressing. Now, at the very moment where advances in education and treatment make the control of the epidemic possible, this takes off here?

In the United States, further efforts are needed for people with HIV to keep the virus in check, according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In the U.S. 70 percent of those living with HIV — or 840,000 out of 1.2 million people — are not consistently taking anti-HIV drugs that keep the virus suppressed at low levels. The trend is especially significant for young adults, where only 13 percent was taking the medication they needed to suppress the virus.

The consistent intake of anti-HIV drugs can lead to near-normal life expectancies of people living with the virus and reduce the risk of transmission with 96 percent, health experts say.

Health experts say U.S. efforts to control the disease have fallen particularly short among the country’s gay and bisexual men of color. In southern states, 68 more black residents are diagnosed with the virus than whites per samples of 100,000 people, according to a Duke University report.

[. . .]

In southern states such as Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, where access to affordable health care is more limited and the supply of medical care providers is insufficient, HIV infections are burgeoning, according to TAG's [Tim] Horn. Nearly half of all new HIV infections are registered in southern states, while the region only accounts for 37 percent of the U.S. population, according to the report.

“We are not a country that is very well acclimated to taking care of our young or poor community members. They simply don’t have access to key services they need,” he said.