The CBC "Message to America" is distributed nationwide to the American Urban Radio Network's (AURN) affiliate stations.

WHO:        U.S. Representative Sanford D. Bishop, Jr. (D-Ga.)

WHEN:      Saturday, October 14, 2006, 2006; 12:06 p.m. EST

WHERE:   American Urban Radio Network Affiliate Stations

"Hello. This is Sanford Bishop, of the 2^nd Congressional District of Georgia, speaking to you today on behalf of the Congressional Black Caucus. Today’s subject is the growing AIDS epidemic within the African American Community, particularly in rural America.

"Twenty-five years after the HIV virus was first documented in gay white men, HIV has increasingly become a disease of color, with African Americans bearing the heaviest burden by far.

"According to a recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, African Americans make up just 13 percent of the U.S. population, but account for an astounding 51 percent of all new HIV diagnoses. That’s over 20,000 new African Americans every year falling prey to AIDS. Although African Americans represent only 17 percent of all teenagers nationwide between the ages of 13 and 19, African American teenagers represent 70 percent of all HIV/AIDS cases among teens.

"In my home state of Georgia, for example, African Americans make up only 30 percent of Georgia’s population, but represent 76 percent of all new cases of AIDS annually.

Moreover, 52 percent of all men with AIDS in Georgia are African American. Eighty-four percent of all women with AIDS in Georgia are African American. Indeed, Georgia ranked third nationwide in new AIDS cases behind the District of Columbia and Maryland.

"However, unlike 25-years-ago, AIDS can now be found in nearly every county in the State of Georgia, places which were once considered almost immune to a scourge which many thought was exclusive to large urban areas.

"There would appear to be a troubling pattern in the epidemic’s uneven and potentially debilitating impact on a growing number of rural communities in America, most notably in our Southern states.

"According to the Georgia Department of Human Resources, about 29 percent of the men who have been diagnosed with AIDS, 43 percent of the women and 47 percent of the children diagnosed with the disease all live outside the metropolitan Atlanta area. This is more than double the number of cases in small and rural communities just 10 years ago.

"And, the number of newly diagnosed AIDS cases among African American women in Georgia’s non-metropolitan small and rural communities is 8 times as high as white women. More troubling, today, AIDS is the leading cause of death among all African American women in Georgia ages 20 – 44.

"In rural communities throughout our nation, including communities within the Congressional District which I represent, public resources like hospitals, clinics and even 911 emergency services are often very scarce or non-existent. Yes, you heard me correctly. There are counties in my Congressional district in Southwest Georgia, which currently do not have 911 emergency services.

"If we are to get a handle on this crisis, we will need to expand the availability of HIV antibody tests, counseling and community planning to both large urban communities and small rural communities.

"We must also facilitate collaborations between public health programs and citizens in these same communities, and provide greater resources, including technical assistance to rural community-based organizations and county health departments, which conduct education and prevention programs.

"Finally, at the national level, we must reverse the fiscal policies and budget priorities of the current Republican Administration, and provide greater funding for urban and rural communities in the areas of housing, education, employment and training, as well as health care and AIDS prevention.

"The battle against AIDS will take the best that African American leaders such as the Congressional Black Caucus, business, religious and other community leaders can offer. It will also take so much more—from the private sector, government and from people of all races, wise and compassionate enough to realize that no community is an island. A crisis engulfing America's most vulnerable citizens, whether they live in the big city or a small rural town, is ultimately a threat to America itself.