AIDS

The latest available figures from the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta put the cumulative number of African-Americans and Latinos infected with the HIV/AIDS virus 319,188 as of June 1999, or nearly half the national total of 688,200 cases nationwide.

Service providers in minority communities say the embarrassment, more than anything else, impedes their efforts to bring help to those in need.

The association of HIV/AIDS with the gay community is part of the problem, according to CDC's Helene Gayle. "Clearly, we know homosexuality is stigmatized across all cultures, but it may even be greater in African-American and Latino communities," she said in a statement earlier this year. "All the evidence suggests that it's harder to be a gay man of color in this society than it is to be a gay white man." Gayle directs the National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention.

According to Dr. Cheryl Smith, chief physician of The AIDS Center at New York's North General Hospital, embarrassment and fear have kept many of the infected from seeking treatment. "There's an association with testing that is negative," she said. "Doing something that's bad. Patients are just scared."

North General Hospital serves both East and Central Harlem and established the AIDS Center to provide a sort of "one-stop shopping" to the AIDS/HIV community, offering primary care, testing and counseling, and housing.

Smith said along with embarrassment, comes fear, and getting patients to come in becomes a challenge. "When you've tested positive, more emotions follow."

"All the evidence suggests that it's harder to be a gay man of color in this society than it is to be a gay white man."

James Pratt, the AIDS Center director, agrees, adding that in the African-American community at least, there is a more generalized fear of the medical establishment. "Fear and mistrust of the government because of the Tuskegee experiment and the whole history of things" get in the way, he said.

Another problem is the gaze of neighbor. "Patients don't utilize community-based organizations for fear of being seen," Smith said. "So there is a tendency to seek services outside the community. Surprisingly, Smith pointed out, "the older population over 50 is as engaged in high-risk behavior" as are adolescents.

One of the center's patients, who identified herself only as "Sugar," seemed to confirm by example what the administrators were saying. Before she finally sought treatment, she said, "I had fear about people looking at me and saying 'Oh, she has AIDS."

produced by Lindsay Goldwert