Health officials stress need for testing
Vida en el Valle
Martin E. Martinez
July 3, 2007

AIDS has become a national epidemic, with Latinos being the second most-affected group after African-Americans.

In order to make to the community aware of the situation, a press conference in Sacramento was held last week where they brought up facts and recommendations for the population on how protect themselves.

This meeting formed part of the national campaign called Test for Life California, which was carried out to a national level.

Gary Puckrein, president of the Forum for the National Quality of Minorities, assured that although advances have been made there is still a lot to do since unfortunately there are many people that are carriers of the illness but do not know it.

"Testing themselves is the only way as the people with HIV can know if they are infected with the virus and is the most effective way to stop its spread," commented Puckrein.

According to data of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at the national level the African-American community is the one that leads in cases of 49 percent, followed by Latinos with 23 percent, being the women who are most affected.

It is also calculated that in the country there is between 250,000 and 300,000 people that have the virus but do not know it. In California it is estimated that there exist nearly 40,000 people that have the virus but do not know.

"We need to educate the population on this situation; a routine test can avoid that the infection continue to spread and early detection helps people acquire adequate treatment that allows them to lead healthy and productive lives," indicated Abner Mason, executive director of the Project of Responsibility for the AIDS.

With respect to the Latino, Assemblymember Bonnie García, R-Cathedral City, said that the situation is complicated especially with women because a great majority do not have adequate health insurance or if they do they fear going to the doctor.

"In our community there are still many taboos about this subject, when women go to the doctor they don't dare ask about these types of illnesses thus making it difficult to know the seriousness of the problem or if it is more serous than we already know," García said.

The Assemblywomen emphasized that high-risk groups previously existed like prostitutes or homosexuals but certainly nowadays the whole community is vulnerable to contracting the virus.

"It is very important that when people see the doctor to have a medical exam or for any other reason, they take the time to ask the doctor about the AIDS test or to get an AIDS test at that same moment; currently there is no need to do an blood examn, with a simple saliva test the virus can be detected."

For three years García has been promoting inside the legislature that women that go to see the doctor be provided with all the information on the illness and this year she included the population in general.

The group Test for Life California will be carrying out test during the month of August for HIV in different events in the state of California, including Los Ángeles, the Bay Area, the Central Valley, San Diego, Imperial Valley, among others.