CDC
Reports Extended HIV/AIDS Surveillance Data
SUMMARY
More than 1.1 million people in the U.S. were living with
HIV at the end of 2008, with 20% not knowing their status.
But the burden is unevenly distributed, with 50% of cases
among gay men and higher incidence among African-Americans. |
By
Liz Highleyman
The
first report of what would come to be known as AIDS was published
in the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity
and Mortality Weekly Report on June 5, 1981.
Three decades later, the CDC has produced an extended surveillance
overview of HIV/AIDS from 1981 through 2008, published in
the June
3, 2011, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
CDC
investigators analyzed data collected through the end of 2010
by the National HIV Surveillance System. AIDS cases have been
reported by name since the early years of the epidemic. Due
to concerns about confidentiality and discrimination, some
states reported HIV infections anonymously or confidentially
for many years, but now all states report new HIV diagnoses
by name.
During the first 14 years after the epidemic became apparent,
"sharp increases" were reported in the number of
new AIDS diagnoses among people age 13 and older, rising from
318 in 1981 to a high of 75,457 in 1992. Deaths among people
with AIDS rose from 451 in 1981 to 50,628 in 1995.
After the advent of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART)
in the mid-1990s, AIDS diagnoses and deaths "declined
substantially" from 1995 through 1998. AIDS diagnoses
fell 45% between 1993 and 1998, while AIDS deaths decreased
by more than 60% from 1995 to 1998. Rates then remained roughly
stable from 1999 through 2008, with an average of approximately
38,000 new AIDS diagnoses and 17,500 deaths per year.
Yet despite the decline in AIDS cases and deaths over the
course of the epidemic, an estimated 1,178,350 people were
living with HIV at the end of 2008. Of these, it is estimated
that 20% -- or about 236,400 individuals -- remain undiagnosed
and potentially unaware of their status.
This report emphasizes the disparity of the HIV/AIDS burden
in the U.S.: while the HIV prevalence was 238 per 100,000
people among whites and 593 per 100,000 among Hispanics/Latinos,
it rose to 1819 per 100,000 among blacks/African-Americans.
Nearly 50% of people living with HIV were men who have sex
with men.
"These findings underscore the importance of the National
HIV/AIDS Strategy focus on reducing HIV risk behaviors, increasing
opportunities for routine testing, and enhancing use of care,"
the report authors concluded.
6/28/11
Reference
Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention. L Torian, M Chen, P Rhodes,
et al. HIV Surveillance -- United States, 1981-2008. Morbidity
and Mortality Weekly Report 60(21):689-693 (free
full text). June 3, 2011.
