December is AIDS Awareness Month

Did you know?

In 2007, 10 in every 100,000 children age birth to 19 in Duval County were diagnosed with HIV.

There have been a total of 112 reported cases of HIV in children age birth to 19 in Duval County from 2002-2007. Ninety-two percent of these cases were among blacks.

Currently, Duval County has a higher rate than Florida but has fluctuated from 2002 - 2007, possibly due to a low incidence of AIDS. The highest rate in Duval County was in 2002 with three out of every 100,000 children diagnosed with AIDS.

Note: While HIV can lead to AIDS these illnesses are tracked separately.

Large numbers of children across the world become infected with HIV every year, and without treatment, thousands die from AIDS. In addition, millions more children who are not infected with HIV are indirectly affected by the epidemic, as a result of the death and suffering that AIDS causes in their families and their communities.

In the United States, the majority of new AIDS cases diagnosed in children younger than age 13 are due to perinatal transmission of HIV. Although new HIV infections among infants have declined substantially since the introduction of certain drugs, perinatal transmission continues to occur, often because HIV-positive pregnant women do not receive appropriate prenatal care or HIV counseling and testing. Transmission most commonly occurs during gestation (pregnancy), during labor and delivery, and during breastfeeding.1

Adherence to treatment is a problem for most people who are HIV positive, but it poses a particular obstacle for children, who must cope with dosing requirements and side effects that even adults find difficult to manage. Children with HIV/AIDS face an array of difficult issues, including social stigma. Unlike adults, school-age children often have no choice about disclosing their HIV status to others. As a result, children often must deal with adult issues associated with having a chronic illness, especially an illness that is stigmatized by society. Children often lack the maturity to effectively manage these issues on their own.2

Caregivers of young children may attempt to protect them from anticipated stigma by postponing telling them about the diagnosis. This decision may be motivated by the caregiver's fear that the child, unaware of the social repercussions of disclosure, will inappropriately reveal the HIV diagnosis.3

1Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). HIV/AIDS Surveillance Report. 2004;16:12. Table 3.

2 Valleroy LA, MacKellar DA, Karon JM, Janssen RS, Hayman DR. HIV infection in disadvantaged out-of-school youth: prevalence for U.S. Job Corps entrants, 1990 through 1996. Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes 1998;19:67–73.