The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a snapshot of HIV infection in the country on January 29. The report showed that about a half of one percent of adults ages 18 to 49 living in households are also living with HIV, Reuters/Yahoo News reports (news.yahoo.com, 1/29), putting the number of HIV-positive people in the U.S. at about 600,000. The study excluded people who are incarcerated, homeless and in institutions.
The study, which included 11,928 adults, confirms other research that show that black men are more likely than any other group of Americans to be HIV positive. Black men ages 40 to 49 had the highest HIV infection rate, at close to 4 percent. What’s more, people with genital herpes were 15 times more likely to also be HIV positive.
The findings do not include data about how many people are newly infected with HIV each year. Some AIDS experts and activists believe that these numbers, which are expected to be released soon, might put the number of new HIV infections nearly 50 percent higher than was previously expected—at 55,000 or 60,000, instead of 40,000.
Beth Benne, RN, is HIV negative, but
the virus has impacted her life. She currently supervises a biannual HIV/AIDS awareness week as
the director of the student health center at Pierce College, a
community commuter school in Woodland Hills, California.
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Overheard in the Women's Forum
"I recently met a guy who is negative. I did tell him about my status and he decided to kiss me anyway (we didn't go further than that). But a day later, he called and said that he actually had a mouth ulcer that time when we kissed and he was very worried. Asked if he can get the virus from me that way. For that moment, I felt so insulted and yet I felt so bad. It was my first time having a contact with a "negative" guy."
