The number of women living with AIDS more than doubled between 1992 and 1998.

By the end of 1998, 58,000 women in the United States were living with AIDS.  Thousands more were infected with the HIV virus.

African American and Latina women are hardest hit.  In 1998, the AIDS rate among African American women was 22 times that of white women.  The AIDS rate among Latinas was 7 times that of white women.

By 1998, over half of all women living with AIDS had been infected through heterosexual contact.   

Women must move beyond the "good " and "bad" girl dichotomy.  We must all become sensible women and plan for sex.  Under many circumstances, sensible women must insist on the use of condoms during heterosexual sex to protect themselves from AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. 

We must put women in charge of their own protection by publicizing the effectiveness of the female condom and making it more available.  

The presence of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) increases the likelihood of both transmitting and acquiring HIV.  The diseases that have been shown to increase the infectiousness of HIV include herpes, chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, chancroid, trichomoniasis and bacterial vaginosis.

Because of their anatomy, women are more vulnerable to STDs than men. 

A woman can be infected with an STD, particular gonorrhea or chlamydia, and not be aware of it.

To prevent the spread of sexually transmitted HIV, the United States needs to:  

	Increase efforts to detect and treat STDs in persons without symptoms.
	Make medical treatment for STDs available to those unable to afford treatment.

In 1998, over 40 percent of all women living with AIDS had been infected through injecting drug use. 

Methadone maintenance is the most effective treatment for heroin, the most commonly injected drug.  Methadone maintenance therapy is available to only about 1 in 5 heroin users in the United States.  Opportunities for methadone maintenance treatment must be expanded. 

To encourage mothers to enter treatment as soon as they realize they have a problem, treatment programs must be designed so that women with children have the option of continuing in their parenting role while they are in treatment.

In many cities and states across the United States, the failure to make needle exchange programs legal means that the laws limiting access to sterile needles are being enforced and causing the spread of AIDS.

Racial profiling has meant that black injecting drug users are more likely to be stopped and searched than are white users.  Racial profiling has also made carrying their own safe needles substantially more risky for black than white users. 

Spreading AIDS among African Americans who inject drugs is not the deliberate policy of any state government or police department.  But, by restricting the sale of sterile needles and by targeting black users for arrest, that has been the result.

This must be changed.  We need drug law enforcement that promotes the public welfare not law enforcement that causes the spread of an incurable disease among African Americans or any other group.

In 1998 there were 67,000 American children, mostly children of color who had lost their mothers to the AIDS epidemic.

Most of these orphans were not infected with HIV.  Some were born before their mothers became HIV-positive.  Others were born free of HIV even though they were born after their mothers were infected.

We must prevent the spread of HIV and the creation of even more orphans.  To do that we must practice safe sex, expand medical treatment for sexually transmitted diseases, expand drug treatment, reform the laws restricting access to sterile needles and end racial profiling.