WORLD AIDS DAY 2011

WORLD AIDS DAY 2011 is upon us. And it's a day that every country possible participates in some form of action/education for HIV/AIDS awareness.

World AIDS Day is observed each year on December 1. This year's theme is "Leading with Science, Uniting for Action". Aids.gov is your 1 stop shop for EVERYTHING you need to know about prevention, taking care of yourself if you have HIV/AIDS, how to educate others on the issue, and everything in between.

Today, women account for more than 1 in 4 new HIV/AIDS cases in the United States, according to WomensHealth.Gov. Of these newly infected women, about 2 in 3 are African-American. Most of these women got HIV from having unprotected sex with a man.

A few staggering stats from the Women's Health website:

AIDS is now the leading cause of death for African-American women ages 25–34. And African-American women are more than 21 times as likely to die from HIV/AIDS as non-Hispanic white women. Some reasons why African-American women are affected by HIV/AIDS more than women of other races include:

Poverty — One in 4 African-American women lives in poverty, which is strongly linked to HIV risk. People living in poverty also get lower-quality health care in general, which can mean advancing from HIV infection to AIDS more quickly.
Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) — HIV is most commonly spread to women through sexual contact. Untreated STIs that break the skin, such as genital herpes, give HIV easy access into the bloodstream. African-American women have high rates of many STIs.

Incarceration of African-American men — Based on current rates of incarceration, nearly one-third of all African-American men will enter prison during their lifetimes. Cycling in and out of the prison system leads to fewer available African-American men in the community to have long-term, faithful relationships and a greater chance of having multiple partners over time. Living in prison also exposes many men to risk factors for HIV. This raises a man's risk of getting HIV in prison and passing HIV to his female partner at home.

In recognition of World AIDS Day, President Obama will speak at 2:30p ET an event hosted by the ONE Campaign and (RED) at George Washington University. You can watch the whole event live on YouTube.com/TheONECampaign.