From: repnomar@leland.Stanford.EDU (Janet M. Lafler)
Subject: Re: Women and AIDS (Was, for some strange reason, Re: All feminists are lesbian man-haters)
Organization: DSG, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 92 03:21:25 GMT

In article <1992Jul30.165508.3827@lmpsbbs.comm.mot.com> bhv@areaplg2.corp.mot.com (Bronis Vidugiris) writes:
>In article <1992Jul30.021047.26587@leland.Stanford.EDU> repnomar@leland.Stanford.EDU (Janet M. Lafler) writes:
>
>)I work in a support position at an outpatient AIDS Clinic in the county 
>)hospital in Oakland, California.  We treat people with AIDS and people who
>)have been infected with HIV but have not yet developed full-blown AIDS.
>)About 20% of our patients are women.  According to the county health de-
>)partment, this is a pretty accurate reflection of the proportion of women 
>)infected with HIV in Alameda County.
>)
>)I also have some data here from the CDC HIV/AIDS monthly report for April,
>)1992.  According to this report, slightly over 10% of the adult/adolescent
>)cases of AIDS reported in the U.S. to date have been in women.  However, 
>)during March, 1991 - April, 1992 about 12.6% of the AIDS cases reported
>)were in women.  This is about 1 in 8 cases.  Remember, though, this is 
>)the number of AIDS cases reported to the CDC.  People whose cases are being 
>)reported now were probably infected at least five years ago.  
>
>That's about what I thought, though I'm a little surprised at the large
>difference between the approximately 8:1 or 10:1 M/F ratio for aids, vs
>5:1 ratio for HIV positiveness.  On the plus side, given the apparent
>problems with the CDC definition, HIV positiveness may be more what
>is desired to measured than AIDS.  On the minus side, the data here for HIV+
>seems to be less precise and more geographically limited (patients at one
>hospital, estimates in one county).

Yes.  I hasten to point out that I did not intend at all to suggest that
Alameda County is representative of the country as a whole.  There are 
some places where the percentage of women infected is probably a lot 
higher (parts of New York and New Jersey, for example, where there's a
very high incidence of HIV infection in injection drug users), but there
are also probably a lot of places where the percentage of women infected
is somewhat lower.

>(I forgot to mention this was US only - it probably is important to note that
>worldwide men and women are victims in fairly equal numbers.)

Yes.

>)in services to poor and indigent people with HIV in the East Bay.  If
>)AIDS is still predominantly a male disease, then why aren't there more
>)men involved in taking care of people with AIDS?
>
>Probably because most nurses are female - regardless of any particular
>specialization.  Are more cardiac intensive care nurses male or female,
>for instance?  [Actually, I gather total deaths are close for heart problems,
>even though at any given age men are at about 3x the risk of women at the
>same age.]

True, but both of our doctors are female, too.  There have been a number of
studies of medical students and physicians which have apparently shown that
female doctors are less likely to be uneasy working with AIDS patients and
to avoid doing so.  Most of this seems to be because straight men are more
uncomfortable working with gay men than straight women are.

/Janet

-- 
Internet: repnomar@leland.stanford.edu // GEnie: J.LAFLER
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"Turnips are strongly emotional vegetables...."
Newsgroups: soc.women