Most students will think of Africa’s epidemic this World AIDS Day, unaware of the epidemic here in the District. Current research reveals that one in 20 adults in the District of Columbia is HIV positive and one in 60 adults has AIDS. HIV is the virus that causes AIDS.
Despite 18 years of international awareness raised by World AIDS Day, D.C. currently faces an increasing amount of AIDS diagnoses within its population, according to Kim Mills, director of communications and public affairs for the Whitman-Walker Clinic, a non-profit D.C. healthcare provider.
“Up to one third of these people don’t know that they are infected,” Mills said. “This contributes to the problem that we see here in Washington.”
A lack of coordination among government agencies responsible for addressing AIDS and poor government leadership have created little in the way of outreach within the District, according to Walter Smith, executive director of D.C. Appleseed, a non-profit organization dedicated to addressing public policy issues.
Mills and Smith both said that testing is the most crucial aspect of AIDS prevention. “We are constantly doing outreach and marketing and advertising; we have two mobile units that we send out around the community to do testing,” Mills said. “One has Spanish language on the vehicle, the other is geared towards the African-American community.”
D.C. Appleseed’s latest research found that black people make up 75 percent of D.C.’s AIDS cases, while Hispanics follow a close second, both locally and nationally.
“I think it’s important to see the problem in the African-American and the Hispanic communities, but it’s striking to see how it’s affecting people in lower socio-economic groups,” Smith said.
These groups are mostly made up of the underinsured in the District.
According to Mills, AIDS patients who qualify for Medicaid can acquire needed treatment. The problem, she said, lies in the gap between the poverty line and the minimum income level for affording insurance.
“You [the underinsured] are caught in that Neverland of never being able to afford the drugs,” Mills said.
According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, the poverty line for a family of four is $19,350 per year.
“Seventy-five percent of our clients are at 200 percent of the federal poverty line of the United States,” Mills said. At this income level, living with AIDS is not affordable.
Dr. Deanna Cooke, Assistant Director of Research for the Center for Social Justice, said that AIDS victims need $13,000 a month to live.
The D.C. Appleseed team is addressing the socio-economic problems surrounding D.C.’s AIDS as well.
“We don’t think it’s being handled in the community right now. We made a number of findings on things that we thought were not being done well,” Smith said. “We made around 75 recommendations.”
Today, D.C. Appleseed releases a report to the District, documenting its progress and specifying categories of action key in slowing the AIDS epidemic.
Smith acknowledged the importance of local community initiatives in raising AIDS awareness, including efforts made by universities like Georgetown.
“They need to stay involved and to work with other groups, and to hold the district government accountable,” Smith said.
Due to the race issues inherent in the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the Georgetown AIDS Coalition, now in its third year, is seeking partnerships with the Black Student Alliance and the GU National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Richard Thayer (CAS ‘07), a member of the GU AIDS Coaliton, said that despite Georgetown’s reputation for activism, there is a “surprisingly low level of people working on the AIDS issue.”
“We’re trying to create a network of groups that are somehow involved in the cause of fighting the AIDS crisis,” he said.
