When AIDS became recognized in 1981 it was understandable that those that became infected ended up with a death sentence, it was a new disease and no one knew it was coming. However in the year 2008 we all know how to protect ourselves, have heard stories about AIDS and personally lost friends and loved ones to AIDS so there is no excuse anymore for catching this disease. No one can try and hide behind ignorance. The only true victims of this disease are the very first victims that were infected during the 60's, 70's and 80's, they had no idea that the disease existed and therefore did not know how to prevent it. You can not prevent something if you don't know that it exists!

African Americans can not expect a white government that historically has shown nothing but disregard for the well being of black people to suddenly be concerned with a disease that we are bringing on ourselves. In addition the government is not responsible to police us in our bedrooms, it is our job to police ourselves and protect ourselves by:

1) Maintaining a monogamous relationship with men and women that are not in and out of jail, not promiscuous, not drug addicts sharing needles and not sneaking around behind our backs sleeping with homosexuals.

2) Stop meeting people in the clubs/bars and having one night stands assuming that they are not carrying AIDS. Everyone that we date must be thought of as an AIDS carrier, period! Put on a condom.

3) Stay off the internet looking for sexual encounters with strangers. There are a lot of people out here who have the disease and don't care if they infect other people.

4) Even if married or in a long term monogamous relationship continue to use condoms. People cheat and have sex outside of their relationships so better to be safe then sorry and end up dead.

5) Stop believing people when you ask them if they are HIV+ and they say no. People lie so use a condom even when they say that they don't have the disease.

The bottom line is this we are responsible for our own sexual behavior and it is our responsibility to protect ourselves from a death sentence. It is not the governments responsiblity. However I can not help but wonder if this epidemic could have been stopped in the beginning if the government would have quarantined the first victims and removed them from the general population.

The new drugs created to prolong AIDS victims lives is wonderful for them and deadly for the rest of us. The drugs keep them living longer but at the same time with them living longer they are here spreading the disease.

You make a good point. Poverty is the root of the problem. What do you suggest each one of us do to alleviate the situation?

It must therefore be obvious that African women and men must be doing something that members of other ethnicities are NOT doing? Funny thing is, researchers have never been able to figure out what that something is. The facts sometimes don't fit the hype.

It's not the condoms. The highest rate of condom usage in the U.S. is among African American woman. It's not related to STD's because gay men, while their HIV prevalence is dropping, are the only ones who are experiencing rise in rates of gonorrhea and syphilis. The suspected "men on the down low" phenomena was debunked by leading researchers from within the CDC itself.

Could it be that the rise in HIV diagnosis is directly related to the incidence of HIV antibody testing within certain demographic groups AND that the margin for error that allows for false positives is the source of this seeming statistical threat to African Americans?

Perhaps, the eugenics movement has stepped up its activity (again) and is using "voluntary unconscious selection" as a means of continuing to lower African American fertility. Perhaps Peter Duesberg was right and groups like Alive and Well, as well as Rethinking AIDS are correct in moving us all away from this distortion of epidemiological science.

Lastly, a total of 14,627 annual deaths from the 30 different diseases collectively known as AIDS is a rather minuscule threat when compared to such diseases as diabetes, which kills 16 times more in the U.S. annually. Yes, I DID say that AIDS definition in the U.S. includes 30 different diseases. Did anyone state that these 30 different diseases produce the leading cause of death for young black men or women? And that this amounts to only half of 14,627 deaths annually?

Please people, brush up your information gathering process and investigate The Great AIDS Hoax. There's far more there than most of could even imagine.

It is not about black or white – in Russia there will be approx 8 million HIV infections in the next decade – it is a global humanitarian issue like the environment and it will require all of our combined efforts to make a difference.

I have heard those comments said so often in America's Youth Today! It's a horror of the way younger American (back, white, other) are looking at the disease.

I worry about the Kids Of America, so many are being killed in our political wars, others with disease including AIDS.

Is it just education that stops it? I dont think so, the FEAR of it need to come back into reality.

To all others. To summarize what I was saying earlier... I believe the higher rate of HIV/AIDS among African-Americans is a result of the choices they have made, PERIOD. Blaming it on education, money... how sad they feel on any given day because of their station in life... whatever... those are excuses. If you make bad choices then you live (or die) with them.

I also wonder that if Black women are contracting HIV from Black men why wouldn't their white partners be at risk also. Where I am from you hardly ever see a black women with a black male it is always black male, white female and these black men are not millionaires but black men who are recently released from incarceration. These white women have several children and baby fathers as well. I think that the tide will turn with black women and HIV to just women with HIV.

CDC:
Transmission Category Estimated # of HIV/AIDS Cases, in 2006

Male-to-male sexual contact 17,465
Injection drug use 3,016 ( Men ) 1,712 (Women)
Male-to-male sexual contact and injection drug use 1,180
High-risk heterosexual contact* 4,152 (Men) 7,432 (Women)

Many of you are only hanging on the coat tails a few that are dominating the American society and the world; if you have to let go of those coat tails, your half a brain won't get you anywhere in society.

So, before you look at Blacks, be introspective and think if you were faced with what we were and still are faced with every day, you would not survive. I'm proud of the African American heritage; still surviving after you have done unspeakable atrocities to us, your race could not survive that. Think, Think, Think.

The above notwithstanding, I think that Black people should begin a campaign of serious lifestyle change, stress education and ethics, foster an attitude that would be the "Black thing" to be educated and smart and totally independent of government hand-outs, so as to stop these half-witted people from treating us like dirt, (those who get their education from biased media outlets) only because they are the so-called 'dominant culture'