WASHINGTON — A prominent AIDS organization accused the federal government Tuesday of doing too little to fight AIDS among black Americans, in whom the size and scope of the epidemic resembles that seen in many African nations.
In a 55-page report, the Black AIDS Institute said AIDS should be viewed as a threat to the entire black population and not just specific high-risk groups. Unlike in white Americans, HIV in American blacks is increasingly transmitted heterosexually through “networks” where men especially have many sex partners at the same time, the report noted.
The report’s authors asserted that the black AIDS epidemic here is being overlooked as the U.S. allocates unprecedented resources to fighting the disease in Africa.
African-Americans with HIV — at least 500,000 — are more numerous than in seven of the 15 “target countries” in the Bush administration’s global AIDS initiative, which has spent about $19 billion overseas in the last five years.
President Bush is scheduled to sign a bill today that will extend the program and authorize the spending of $48 billion for the next five years.
The report noted that with 39 million people, “black America” would be the 35th-most populous country and the 28th-richest if it were a separate nation.
Two percent of adult American blacks are infected, the government estimates, and only four countries outside Africa have a higher HIV prevalence. It would rank 16th in the world in the number of people living with HIV.
Also Tuesday, the United Nations reported a steady decline in the global number of people infected with HIV to 2.7 million last year, from 3 million in 2001. AIDS-related deaths fell from 2.2 million in 2005 to 2 million last year, primarily because of an increase in the availability of drug treatment, particularly in Africa.
The international effort to fight AIDS is guided by a strategic plan; clear benchmarks such as the prevention of 7 million HIV infections by 2010; and annual progress reports to Congress, the group said.
By contrast, it went on, “America itself has no strategic plan to combat its own epidemic.”
“We recognize this is a crisis, and clearly more can be done,” said Kevin A. Fenton, head of HIV/AIDS prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Black AIDS Institute, based in Los Angeles, describes itself as the only national HIV/AIDS study group focused exclusively on black people. Phill Wilson, the group’s chief executive and an author of the report, said his group supported the international anti-AIDS program. But Wilson’s report also said that “American policy makers behave as if AIDS exists ‘elsewhere’ — as if the AIDS problem has been effectively solved” in the U.S.
The group also chided the government for not reporting HIV statistics to the United Nations for inclusion in its biannual report.
Fenton said the CDC had ensured that its data were forwarded to officials in the Department of Health and Human Services and was investigating why the data were not in the U.N. report.
