For QUESTION ONE, go to AIDS INFO Graphs from the Eighth Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections.
1. Which region of the United States has the highest number of estimated HIV/AIDS cases in the years 1997-1999--the Northeast, South, or Midwest?
For QUESTIONS TWO-FIVE, go to The U.S. Center for Disease Control's Statistics pages.
2. What four cities in the United States had had the highest number of AIDS cases reported as of December, 2001(counting all cases reported from the beginning of the epidemic until December, 2001)?
3. What four states in the United States had had the highest number of AIDS cases reported as of December, 2001 (counting all cases reported from the beginning of the epidemic until December, 2001)?
4. In the United States, the largest number of AIDS cases is reported in which age group?
5. Look at Table 14: HIV Infection Cases in Adolescents and Adults Under 25 . . . in the 2001 surveillance report. For the two age groups shown on this table, there are two columns each. One column shows HIV infections reported in 2001; and one shows total infections reported since the beginning of the epidemic. In persons aged 13-19, were more HIV infections reported in males or females during the 2001 year? Is this different from reported HIV infections in the past years? Or is the same group still getting infected?
6. Keep looking at Table 14. How are most young men (under age 24) infected with HIV--through (a), injecting drugs; (b), sex with women; or (c), sex with men?
What about young women (under age 24)? Are most infected with HIV through (a), injecting drugs; (b), sex with men; or (c), or sex with women?
For QUESTION 7, go to Who's Epidemiological fact sheet on HIV/AIDS and STIs for the Central African Republic. Check out also fact sheets for other African countries linked to at: Who's HIV/AIDS country information page.
7. Compare your answers to questions 7-8 to the situation in Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa has been the part of the world most affected by the HIV epidemic. In Sub-Saharan Africa, is it women or men who have the highest infection rate? How is this group infected--by drug use, heterosexual sex, or homosexual sex? What do you make of what is happening in the United States when you compare it with what is happening in Africa? (If you like, go back and read Edgar Allen Poe's story, The Mask of the Red Death, and think of what Poe said about the Red Death.)
For QUESTIONS 8-10, go to The U.S. Center for Disease Control's HIV Fact Sheets, especially to HIV/AIDS Among Women, and HIV/AIDS Among Youth.
8. What percentage of new infections in the United States in 2004 occurred in young people age 13-24?
9. Compare HIV prevalence in persons 16-21 (Job Corps data on the HIV/AIDS among Women page). What percentage of women are HIV infected? Of men? What about overall new infections of HIV? What percentage of these occur in women? In men?
10. In 2002, HIV/AIDS was the leading cause of death for what group of women? For what group of men is HIV/AIDS currently the leading cause of death?
For QUESTION 11, Go to The World Health Organization (WHO)'s 1998 World AIDS Day Press Release.
11. In the world, how many young people are infected with HIV every minute?