What's standing in the way of dealing with this crisis?
Stigma — Many people still believe that HIV/AIDS is related exclusively to specific lifestyles or behaviors. If they disapprove of those lifestyles, they disapprove of anyone who is HIV positive. As a result, people are reluctant to talk about HIV/AIDS – it's often considered a taboo subject, seldom open for discussion.
Denial that HIV/AIDS is still a problem — It’s a common perception that we've gotten HIV/AIDS under control in the United States, and that the problem is all overseas now. Because we don’t talk about it, we think it's not here.
Perception that it's other people's problem — By associating HIV/AIDS with certain populations or groups, we assume that we ourselves are not at risk if we're not part of those groups. So we think we don't need to worry about getting infected ourselves, and we don't protect ourselves from the virus.
And what we don't acknowledge or discuss with each other, we also don't discuss with our health care providers. So we don't know for certain whether we might be infected ourselves, and we pass along the virus without even knowing we have it.
In the United States, our refusal to recognize that there's a problem affecting all of us continues to cost lives — and leads to persistent and increasing rates of new HIV infections. Our collective lack of awareness has resulted in a collective failure to halt the HIV/AIDS epidemic.