At the beginning of the AIDS crisis, there was no treatment for people infected with HIV, nor was there pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), a prescription-based daily pill or injection that could be taken by people other than those infected with HIV to prevent HIV infection and its spread. In addition, systemic racism in the field of public health often excluded Black patients.
“At the time, this incident really exposed the vulnerability of our community and the lack of safety nets we lacked to deal with any type of crisis,” said Vincent Surratt, archives director at the Rainbow History Project. american university radio About the early days of the crisis.
“This is what happened in the beginning. We didn’t have health care. We had very little medicine available. We didn’t have access to adequate housing or support. And it was a show of hands, not benefits. HIV-AIDS exposed the worst that could happen to our community. And that’s what happened. It was a disaster in progress.”
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result? Within a decade after HIV first emerged as a threat to gay white men, black patients largest group The number of new infections declined in the late 1980s, and this trend is likely to continue into the 1990s and beyond. But the federal system offered little help. It was the responsibility of the black community itself to set up a relief system.
For the first decade of the AIDS epidemic, queer people of color suffered with no access to treatment. In 1986, Dr. Arthur Brewer, chairman of the National Minority AIDS Council, spoke at a panel in St. Louis about combating the perception that AIDS is a “white gay man’s disease.”
“AIDS has been prevalent in the black community since the beginning, but it will continue to die in large numbers because we refuse to talk about it and refuse to educate about it,” he said, according to archives at Washington University in St. Louis.
The National Black Lesbian and Gay Coalition similarly noted that many organizations serving the Black community have shown a disinterest in serving queer voters.
“Because black people deny homosexuality as a community problem, they also deny AIDS, but what they don’t realize is that this disease is increasingly affecting straight men and, at the national level, is primarily caused by IV drug users,” NCBLG co-founder Gil Gerard said in 1986.
Washington DC has a large black population, Whitman Walker Medical Clinic We launched an outreach specifically for the LGBTQ+ community to ensure residents were informed about breakthroughs in HIV treatment and prevention. The city government has produced a candid video about not only the threat of AIDS, but also how gay men can practice safe sex and limit the spread of the disease. As AIDS became more prevalent in communities, so did condom dispensers in local bars.
when black pride was founded in Washington, D.C., in 1991, and organizers Welmore Cooke, Theodore Kirkland, and Ernest Hopkins emphasized the urgency of organizing the queer black community. The city also opened one of the first government-run offices for LGBTQ+ issues.
As the AIDS crisis shifted to disproportionately impact black communities, other organizations sprung up. of Black AIDS Research Institute Founded by HIV-positive black activist Phil Wilson, the group formed in Atlanta in 1999. The institute served as a large-scale outreach effort to educate Black Americans about the prevalence of AIDS in their communities and the growing treatment options.
“At institutions like AID Atlanta, the city’s main AIDS support organization, white gay men dominated leadership positions and volunteer organizations,” LGBTQ+ history professor Dan Royles wrote in 2021. The Baffler.
“Black gay men did not see themselves reflected in efforts to tackle the new disease and believed they were isolated from the disease. Yet by 1983, more than a quarter of those diagnosed with AIDS in the United States were black, nearly twice their share of the national population.”
Royles details the emergence of the first black LGBTQ+ groups and their focus on HIV in his book. Lifting Up the Wounded: The African American Fight Against HIV/AIDS.
for example, Bebashi In 1985, Philadelphia became the first organization in the United States to address the AIDS epidemic in the African American community. It is still in operation and offers free testing for sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.
A national effort to educate about the crisis was also underway. When compiled by Joseph Beam In the Life: A Black Gay Anthologythe story of 29 gay black men, and prominently included stories about the impact of AIDS on the subculture.
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Efforts were carried out on both coasts. In 1989, AIDS Project Los Angeles directed $100,000 in education funds to black and Latino gay and bisexual men. “That’s the number one priority in terms of primary prevention,” said Foundation CEO Stephen Bennett. Los Angeles Times at that time. This effort created an organization to address public health service deficiencies that spanned the 1990s.
Around 1996, the San Francisco AIDS Foundation was founded. Black Brothers Esteema psychosocial support program for the Black LGBTQ+ community. In its early stages, the program called on the entire black community to support at-risk gay men while ensuring that black men battling the disease were connected to medical care.
Inequalities in support for queer black men compared to white men continue to manifest as unequal care. According to the report, PrEP uptake in minority communities remains lower than among white people, who are at higher risk of contracting the virus. National Institutes of Health. But more than ever, more organizations are aiming to expand both public education and the availability of the latest treatments.
Source: Advocate.com – www.advocate.com
