PRESS
RELEASE CONTACT: Lisa Hazijian, Executive
Director
A $1.9M federal
grant will allow the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services to expand
the state’s work to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic among minority gay, bisexual,
and other men who have sex with men.
The
program will address barriers to testing and healthcare by creating MSM safe spaces
around the state, piloting a faith-based initiative and a men’s clinic, and linking
prisoners to care after their release. It will also expand the Department’s
testing capacity.
“This
grant is great news for North Carolina, where 35,000 people are living with HIV,”
said Lisa Hazirjian, executive director of the North Carolina AIDS Action Network.
“The burden
of the HIV/AIDS epidemic falls more heavily on certain communities,” Hazirjian
said. “Addressing these disparities is one of our key challenges. With these
funds, the state and federal governments are taking meaningful steps to meet
that challenge.”
More than
half of North Carolina’s HIV/AIDS cases are among gay, bisexual, and other men
who have sex with men.
Black men
consistently represent more than 60 percent of cases in North Carolina. They
are eight times more likely than white men to contract the virus. Rates of
death from HIV/AIDS in the black community are 13 times higher than in the
white community.
Hispanic
men have the second highest rate of new HIV cases in the state, and they are more
likely to get diagnosed late than other groups.
“It’s very appropriate that this news comes in
the week in which we observe National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day,” said
Hazirjian. “Public support for programs that reach the people most affected by HIV/AIDS
is critical as we work to together to end this epidemic.”
The
three-year grant is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through
the Secretary’s Minority AIDS Initiative’s Care and Prevention in the United
States program.
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