Consequences of miscegenation increase
Dalton, Ga., resident Edgardo, an El Salvador native who immigrated to the United States five years ago, thought his life was over when he was diagnosed with HIV last year.
“When I heard I was HIV positive I felt like my whole life had ended with just that word,” he said in Spanish, “but now I realize it was just a bridge, and life goes on.”
Edgardo, 28, who asked to only be identified by his middle name because he fears being rejected by some in the Hispanic community, is part of the growing number of Hispanics who are being diagnosed with HIV locally and nationwide, local experts say.
Of the rates of diagnoses for adults and adolescents in all racial and ethnic groups in 2005, the highest rate was for blacks, with 68.7 cases per 100,000 people, followed by Hispanics, with 24 cases per 100,000 people, according to the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Tom Rucci, AIDS outreach coordinator with the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Health Department, said Hispanics account for 2 percent of the total HIV/AIDS cases in the county.
“The number is small but is still alarming given the fact that we need to do more testing, and this population is less likely to be tested, and if positive, less likely to seek treatment,” he said.
In Whitfield County, from 1980 to December 2007, not adjusted for reporting delays, there are 103 AIDS and 41 HIV (non-AIDS) cases, of which Hispanics make 16 percent, according to the Georgia Department of Health.