The Nation - News from Aug. 27, 1989

There are likely to be more new cases of AIDS among drug addicts than among homosexual men in the next two years as the focus of the epidemic increasingly shifts to poor, drug-ridden urban neighborhoods, researchers predicted at a Washington meeting. Over 40% of reported AIDS cases have occurred in blacks and Latinos, although the two groups constitute only about 20% of the U.S. population, said Dr. Harold Jaffe of the federal Centers for Disease Control, adding that this is because the vast majority of drug addicts with AIDS are black or Latino and because infected addicts often transmit the virus to their sexual partners or unborn infants. A mathematical analysis suggests that about 1.2 million people carry the AIDS virus, and nearly half of those infected are black or Latino, said Philip S. Rosenberg of the NCI.