Southern 'Crisis' in HIV/AIDS Highlights Urgent Need for Change

An MSNBC article [Report warns of AIDS ‘crisis’ across South] on a manifesto by the Southern AIDS Coalition is a vivid example of what happens in communities nationwide when the relationships among socioeconomic factors and HIV/AIDS incidence are not taken into account.

This is just further justification for a policy demand currently being crafted by the National Women and AIDS Collective (NWAC) . NWAC, housed at the Ms. Foundation, and led by our Women and AIDS Fund grantees, is calling on the CDC to collect data about factors such as incarceration rates, domestic violence, or access to affordable housing as a part of its routine HIV surveillance--a data collection process by which health-care providers and state and local health departments report new HIV cases nationwide. Without more comprehensive data about issues known to elevate ones risk of HIV infection, prevention and intervention programs won't be adequately designed or funded to stop the spread of the virus. And people who live in poorly resourced places--whether it's the South or South Central, LA--and are denied sufficient access to health care, jobs, transportation, and housing, will continue to experience higher rates of HIV/AIDS.

Image from: Southern States Manifesto: Update 2008 / HIV/AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases in the South July 21, 2008 [pdf]