The AIDS epidemic is a solvable problem. Ending AIDS is not just an aspiration, like finding a cure for cancer or understanding the human brain. Scientists have developed the diagnostic tools and disease management drugs they need to stop the spread of infection.
Despite all of this, explained Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Disease at a recent Atlantic forum, the rate of new infections has stopped decreasing, remaining at a plateau over the last decade.
Why? At least part of the cause is the stigma against homosexuality in the black community, Fauci and others agreed.
“We can’t forget that in this country, the risk [of HIV infection] for a young gay man, particularly a young African-American man—the risk is really huge,” Fauci said. “But there’s still discrimination and stigma.”
Fauci described how this problem has taken shape in Washington, D.C., where about half of the population is black. In predominantly white areas, the prevalence of HIV/AIDS is very low, he said, but in predominantly black areas, “the rate is seven or eight percent. The disparity is not only of African Americans who are disenfranchised from health care, but also the difficulty of social acceptance in the African American community of a gay man of color.”
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