Poor Black and Hispanic Homosexuals: The Face of AIDS — And the Left

There's blood on the hands of Democrat Party progressivism. I reported previously on the AIDS resurgence among gay men resulting from the careless death-wish ideology of sexually licentious progressivism. See, "Defiant Promiscuous Homosexuality: Surge in Barebacking Threatens Resurgence of AIDS Epidemic."

And now the New York Times provides an even more immediate report on the crisis, "Poor Black and Hispanic Men Are the Face of H.I.V.":

The AIDS epidemic in America is rapidly becoming concentrated among poor, young black and Hispanic men who have sex with men.

Despite years of progress in preventing and treating H.I.V. in the middle class, the number of new infections nationwide remains stubbornly stuck at 50,000 a year — more and more of them in these men, who make up less than 1 percent of the population.

Giselle, a homeless 23-year-old transgender woman with cafe-au-lait skin, could be called the new face of the epidemic.

“I tested positive about a year ago,” said Giselle, who was born male but now has a girlish hair spout, wears a T-shirt tight across a feminine chest and identifies herself as a woman. “I don’t know how, exactly. I was homeless. I was escorting. I’ve been raped.”

“Yes, I use condoms,” she added. “But I’m not going to lie. I slip sometimes. Trust me — everyone here who says, ‘I always use condoms’? They don’t always.”

Besides transgender people like Giselle, the affected group includes men who are openly gay, secretly gay or bisexual, and those who consider themselves heterosexual but have had sex with men, willingly or unwillingly, in shelters or prison or for money. (Most of those interviewed for this article spoke on the condition that only their first names be used.)

Nationally, 25 percent of new infections are in black and Hispanic men, and in New York City it is 45 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the city’s health department.

Nationally, when only men under 25 infected through gay sex are counted, 80 percent are black or Hispanic — even though they engage in less high-risk behavior than their white peers.

The prospects for change look grim. Critics say little is being done to save this group, and none of it with any great urgency.

“There wasn’t even an ad campaign aimed at young black men until last year — what’s that about?” said Krishna Stone, a spokeswoman for GMHC, which was founded in the 1980s as the Gay Men’s Health Crisis.

Phill Wilson, president of the Black AIDS Institute in Los Angeles, said there were “no models out there right now for reaching these men.”

Federal and state health officials agreed that it had taken years to shift prevention messages away from targets chosen 30 years ago: men who frequent gay bars, many of whom are white and middle-class, and heterosexual teenagers, who are at relatively low risk. Funding for health agencies has been flat, and there has been little political pressure to focus on young gay blacks and Hispanics.

Reaching those men “is the Holy Grail, and we’re working on it,” said Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of H.I.V. prevention at the C.D.C. His agency created its Testing Makes Us Stronger campaign — the one Ms. Stone referred to — and has granted millions of dollars to local health departments and community groups to pay for testing.

But he could not name a city or state with proven success in lowering infection rates in young gay minority men.

“With more resources, we could make bigger strides,” he said.

Continue reading.

This is precisely the demographic the left purports to champion --- yet poor minorities are wallowing in a deathly downward spiral of AIDS-related hopelessness:

Among the poor, untreated or inadequately treated H.I.V. is the norm, not the exception, said Perry N. Halkitis, a professor of psychology and public health at New York University. According to the C.D.C., 79 percent of H.I.V.-infected black men who have sex with men and 74 percent of Hispanics are not “virally suppressed,” meaning they can transmit the infection, either because they are not yet on antiretroviral drugs or are not taking them daily.

It's the freakin' norm!

And progressives don't even care. Obama-style "gay rights" activists are all about homosexual marriage and LGBT activism, and yet here we are with this disgusting crisis of sick homosexual metastasis at the core of a vulnerable generation.

And it will get worse, because disease and sickness can only get worse as the Democrats continue to chip away at the decency and health of society. This is what happens when defiant promiscuity and progressive politics combine. More people die. And the so-called compassionate political party doesn't do jack.