AIDS Project RI holds expanded hours for HIV testing

PROVIDENCE – In honor of National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, AIDS Project RI will offer expanded testing hours for HIV, Hepatitis C and syphilis on Tuesday, Feb. 7. A division of Family Service of Rhode Island, AIDS Project RI will offer free, fast and anonymous testing from noon through 7 p.m., at 9 Pleasant St. in Providence; no appointments are necessary for the walk-in tests, which require only a cheek swab, not a blood draw.

Although African-Americans constitute only 7 percent of the Rhode Island population, they accounted for nearly 21 percent of newly identified HIV cases between 2010-14, according to data from the R.I. Department of Health. Nationally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s estimates indicate that African-Americans account for 44 percent of all new HIV infections in 2010 and represent 40 percent of all individuals living with HIV in 2013.

While DOH Director Dr. Nicole Alexander-Scott has encouraged everyone to be tested for HIV/AIDS at least once in their lifetime, individuals with certain risk factors should be tested more frequently. Annual testing is recommended for men who have sex with men and for people who have multiple sexual partners, inject drugs intravenously or have been diagnosed with or sought treatment for some other sexually transmitted disease.

On Feb. 7 and beyond, the goal, said AIDS Project RI Executive Director Stephen Hourahan, is getting into the African-American community to explain the importance of testing and ensuring that DOH has an opportunity through outreach to test as many people as it can who might not be aware of their HIV status.

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The major stigma attached to HIV in African-American communities in major cities across the country and the lack of awareness about testing resources, said Hourahan, makes it very challenging to reach such individuals. “Our [African-American] clients who have HIV … their families don’t know. We can’t put the name, ‘AIDS Project RI’ on our building; people wouldn’t come here. That translates to, ‘If I don’t know my status, the stigma won’t attach to me.’ ”

Given that challenge, AIDS Project RI’s caseworkers are fanning out to wherever they know African-American individuals often gather, including churches, storefronts on Broad Street in Providence, housing projects, etc. “We really need to understand just how much of a difficulty [HIV is] for people to talk about in the community,” said Hourahan.

There is some promising news, however. HIV-positive individuals on medication who have undetectable viral loads cannot transmit HIV to another individual, said Hourahan, who noted the following goal, one established by DOH a few years ago: 90 percent of people living with HIV to know their status, 90 percent of those individuals to be in care and 90 percent of that cohort to get to undetectable viral load levels. That 90-90-90 campaign is a statewide program that began two years ago, he said. “If we can get to that [goal], we can stop the disease dead in its tracks.”

The AIDS Project RI testing site will also offer information about medications that reduce individuals’ risk of HIV infection. Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, or PrEP, is an approach, said Hourahan, that allows an HIV-negative individual at risk of exposure to take a once-daily pill, for as long as he or she is engaging in unprotected sex or IV-drug use, which are high risk factors for contracting HIV, or for life. The Post-Exposure Prophylaxis, or PEP, approach allows an HIV-negative individual to take a short regime of HIV medications within 72 hours after being exposed to HIV.

“PrEP basically makes you immune to HIV … and PEP will kill the virus before it takes hold,” said Hourahan, who noted that many insurance companies cover the costs of PrEP and drug companies also may assist with prescription costs.

“We still recommend practicing safe sex” by using condoms even for those who are HIV-negative or have undetectable viral loads, said Hourahan, as PrEP and PEP don’t protect against other sexually transmitted diseases. Moreover, someone whose viral load at one point in time is undetectable – and thus, a “safe” partner – may decide to stop taking the medication that keeps him or her from transmitting the disease.

Individuals whose test results are positive are sent to The Miriam Hospital for a confirmatory test, said Hourahan.

HIV will continue to hit the African-American community hard, if national rates don’t change. Data from a CDC August 2016 Fact Sheet predicts that one in 20 black men, one in 48 black women and one in two black gay/bisexual men will be diagnosed with HIV during their lifetimes. CDC data shows that African-American men’s rate of new HIV infections is more than six times higher than that for white men and more than twice that of Hispanic men. The rate of new HIV infections for black women is 20 times higher than that of white women’s rates and nearly five times that of Hispanic women’s rates.

For more information, visit aidsprojectri.org or call (401) 831-5522.

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