The crisis for African American women

	Over 46,000 African American women had injection-related AIDS or had already died from it, by the end of 2000. Thousands more were infected with HIV.(1)
	AIDS was among the top five leading causes of death among African American women age 20 to 54 in 1999.(2) Over 60 percent of those deaths were drug-related.(3)
	The AIDS death rate for African American women age 25 to 34 was seventeen times higher than the AIDS death rate for white women aged 25 to 34 in 1999.(2)

Footnotes

(1) Injection-related AIDS cases include women infected through use of a dirty needle and women infected through heterosexual sex with a man who injected drugs. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2000. HIV/AIDS surveillance report. U.S. HIV and AIDS cases reported through December 2000. vol. 12, no.2. Table 23.  

(2) As a cause of death among African American women (non-Hispanic) in 1999, AIDS was:
fifth for those aged 20-24
first for those aged 25-34
third for those aged 35-44
fifth for those aged 45-54.
National Vital Statistics Reports. 2001. “Deaths: Leading Causes for 1999,”  Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics, by Robert N. Anderson, vol. 49, no. 11, October 12. Table 2. Available in Adobe Acrobat.

(3) The estimate that over 60 percent of all AIDS deaths among African American women aged 25 to 34 are drug-related is based on the percentage of all AIDS cases among African American women that are drug-related. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2000. HIV/AIDS surveillance report. U.S. HIV and AIDS cases reported through December 2000. vol. 12, no.2. Table 23.  

For a list of other materials used on this website, see References.