Wanted: Real conversations about HIV

At one of the breakout sessions – titled ``Addressing Policy Changes: Lessons Learned'' – a senior US government official on HIV policy said that all the talk here about HIV testing was important, but he believed something more important needed to happen first:

People need to talk more openly about HIV across the United States – and that includes behavior that leads to infections, said Christopher Bates, director of the Office of HIV/AIDS Policy for the US Department of Health and Human Services.

``When I travel across the country, I still meet people who have never had a conversation with someone about HIV,’’ he said. ``…We have not had real conversations in public forums in America about it. We didn’t take advantage in this country when a major leader was having sexual activities to talk about HIV, or when a famous minister got a young woman pregnant. We let that opportunity go.’’

Bates said the advocates should ``start at the real ground zero -- have the conversation about sexual engagement and substance abuse, including alcohol, that (leads people) to being infected.’’

He said much needed to change. Two examples:

`` Black gay men in particular have not had themselves embraced appropriately so we wouldn’t have at least half of all new infections coming from this community.’’

And: `` Truth is, we still have doctors who don’t want to talk about HIV. We still have nurses who don’t want to talk about HIV. … There are people in our clinical environments who are homophobic, who don’t want to work with substance abusers.’’

But he did note one ray of hope for him. He talked about President-elect Barack Obama.

``I’m very glad we have an incoming president who wants to talk about a national AIDS plan,’’ Bates said. ``It will allow us to put some elements forward that have been on the back burner.’’