Blaming HIV rates on black men who were "on the down low" always struck some folks I know as a way to maintain the perception of HIV as a "gay disease," and therefore a pretext for scapegoating the LGBT community for rising HIV/AIDS rates in the black community. This recent comment from Dr. Kevin Fenton, director of the Centers for Disease Control’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention, seems to vindicate that theory (from Alvin McEwen at Pam's House Blend):
“We know that a lot of the infections are actually coming from male partners who have high-risk behavior,” Fenton said in an interview in his Atlanta office. “In fact, we have looked to see what proportion of infections is coming from male partners who are bisexual and found there are actually relatively few. More are male partners who are having female partners and are injecting drugs or using drugs or have some other risks that may put those female partners at risk of acquiring HIV.”
That's not to say that HIV and AIDS aren't ravaging the black community, just to say that the HIV rate among African Americans isn't the result of men who are hiding their sexual orientation from their partners.
It's peripherally related, but you really should be reading the Washington Post's series on how the AIDS crisis in Washington, D.C., was completely mismanaged--and how millions were squandered on disreputable nonprofits that took the money and then did nothing. It's both an example of how one can't simply throw money at a problem--and how sometimes doing so is less an indication that governments recognize the urgency of an issue than that they aren't that interested in dealing with it.
-- A. Serwer
