PartnersGF - 2004-07-17
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IAC 2004: Q&A - Missed opportunities
HDN Key Correspondents Team
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In the US, African Americans are disproportionately affected by HIV and AIDS; representing about 12% of the population, they accounted for 50% of the estimated AIDS cases among adults in 2002.
A study of people diagnosed with HIV found that over 50% of late testers those who develop AIDS within one year of being diagnosed HIV positive were African American. This means opportunities for the prevention and treatment of HIV in this population are being missed.
The Correspondent interviewed Phil Wilson, executive director of the Black AIDS Institute, which is based in Los Angeles, California.
Q: What do you think is spurring the HIV epidemic in the African American community?
A: Obviously poverty is an issue. So is lack of access to proper health care, including health information; the stigma that surrounds HIV and AIDS; the relationship between AIDS and sexuality and sexual orientation; and drug use
You compound that with the systemic legacy of racism pervasive in the United States, and, in fact, you see two Americas: one America that is overwhelmingly white, wealthy and healthy; another America that is increasingly black and brown, poor and unhealthy. This creates an ideal environment for HIV to flourish.
Q: What do you think are the results of the funding cuts that have stopped some US scientists attending the Conference?
A: There is a possibility that some of those scientists who are not here as a result of the pullback of funds by the US government may have been presenting papers on the AIDS epidemic as it impacts African Americans. It puts into question the USs commitment to the global epidemic. So I think that the fact that the US has staked out a claim as a leader in the global fight against AIDS, and yet is, to all intents and purposes, absent from the most important AIDS scientific conference in the world, is a contradiction. While we have made promises of 15 billion dollars over five years, our provision of those dollars is not keeping up with the promise. At the same time, when you look at whats going on with AIDS in America, you see a flat-lining of HIV/ AIDS resources. Then we begin to lose credibility on the global stage.
Q: Are culturally appropriate prevention and media messages reaching the African American community?
A: Its about messages from us and by us. There has sprung up a whole industry of scientists, researchers and prevention workers who develop culturally-appropriate messages by observing us, making us into lab rats. When I have a conversation as a black man who has been living with HIV for 24 years, and who has full-blown AIDS, and I talk to an African American who is 19 years old and about to begin his life it is a very different conversation than when a white outreach worker does the same, or even a white doctor.
Q: Is the emphasis on US funding of international HIV initiatives pulling funds from African Americans?
A: I know that structurally they dont, but I think that symbolically they absolutely do. Because when the administration gets political mileage out of a promise to spend 15 billion dollars to fight AIDS in developing countries they have to cover up when they dismantle the domestic healthcare delivery system. [President Bush] is standing in front of African Americans talking about AIDS in the black community, talking about initiatives that have nothing to do with them, while supporting policies that will kill them because there will not be sufficient resources to build prevention efforts in black communities.
HDN Key Correspondents Team
Email: correspondents@hdnet.org
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Today's Quote
"If we demanded from our leadership what we want, these huge problems could all be over in five years. We are letting our elected leaders get away with this."
Mary Robinson
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