Dr. Jonathan Mermin is director of CDC’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention. “Consistent care matters. It enables people with HIV to live longer, healthier lives, and it prevents new infections,” he said in the news release. “And closing this gap in care will be essential if we are to see the narrowing racial divide in HIV diagnoses close completely.”
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From 2011 to 2013, only 38 percent of black HIV patients received consistent treatment. During this period, however, about 50 percent of whites and Hispanics with the virus had continuous care, according to the CDC’s Feb. 4 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
Black women with HIV fared better than black men, the CDC noted. While 44 percent of black women benefitted from routine care, just 35 percent of black men did the same. Most of the black HIV patients who received ongoing care were infected during heterosexual contact.
Health officials in the United States are striving for a more coordinated response to the HIV epidemic, the CDC said. These efforts include using HIV prevention strategies that target blacks and others at greatest risk to ensure those who are diagnosed receive continuous medical care. State health departments will also receive funding to expand HIV prevention services and treatment to black people, particularly gay, bisexual and transgender youth.
SOURCE: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, news release, Feb. 2, 2016
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