The epidemic rate of infection continues to worry city officials, as over 3% of District residents older than 12 are living with HIV or AIDS. However, a report released Wednesday offers hope, informing the past four years have seen a steady decline in new cases of AIDS and AIDS-related deaths.

According to the 2009 Epidemiology Update, a report the D. C. HIV/AIDS Administration (HAA) issues annually, in a 9% increase from the previous saw at least 16,513 residents tested had a form of the disease at the end of 2008.

However, it is evident that aggressive testing and treatment efforts are beginning to work, possibly even leading to a decrease in HIV cases, the illness that causes AIDS, as new cases of full-blown AIDS and AIDS-related deaths are on the decline.

According to the report, the number of people diagnosed with AIDS declined from 786 in 2004 to 525 in 2008, with AIDS deaths falling from 379 in 2004 to 274 in 2007.

The improvement is credited to an increase in testing and medical clinics providing primary care to HIV or AIDS patients.

A Washington Post investigation revealing certain care groups failed to obtain business licences and file tax returns resulted in the HIV/AIDS Administration coming under scrutiny. In addition, there were others who gave false information about employee résumés and consulting contracts, spending lavishly on travel and executive salaries.

In 2008, the city together with its community partners tested 75,000 people for HIV, as compared with 43,000 the year before, while in 2009, 95,000 people were tested and condoms distributed to 3.5 million.

African Americans are Washington city’s highest-risk group, and while black residents represent half the city’s population, 75% of them have HIV and AIDS. Compare that with white residents comprising 35% of the population and only 16% of them known to be infected. Hispanics represent 8% of the population, with 5% the infected.

The most common reported form of HIV transmission is sex among men (37%), followed by heterosexual contact (27%). Intravenous drug use accounts for 17& of transmissions, while 15% of those testing positive failing to indicate how they had contracted the disease.

For the first time in the city’s history, heterosexual contact is overtaking sex among men as a mode of transmission among African Americans. The number of black people reporting transmission through gay sex (30%) and heterosexual sex (29%) is almost equal.

According to the report, African Americans represent nearly 90% of people dying from the disease.

Between 2004 to 2007, the percentage of white deaths from AIDS declined, with the percentage of black deaths increasing. Regardless of age, the average age most people died was 40 to 49-years or 38% of the total, with 50 to
59 the second highest age group.

Teenagers and under 30 adults made up 85% of those who tested positive for gonorrhea and Chlamydia, two sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), with high school-age teenagers representing 41% of cases.

However, gay African Americans say the methodology of the study is flawed and not a representative sample, as it sampled mostly white men attending nightclubs and haunts black gays rarely visit.

The HIV Counselling and Testing campaign (HCT) will be launched on 15th April running till the end of next year, with all attending a clinic or hospital offered an HIV test, regardless of whether they have the symptoms or not.

The campaign has four objectives: to increase health-seeking behaviour; to encourage South Africans to know their HIV status; to equip those who test HIV-negative with ways of ensuring that they don't get HIV; and to create access to treatment services for those who test HIV-positive.