WBEZ | HIV

$6M awarded to improve housing for people with HIV

Fri, 28 Dec 2012 09:07:00 -0600

The Chicago Department of Public Health has awarded $6 million to 22 community organizations for housing assistance and support services for people living with HIV and AIDS and their families.

The grants come from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The money goes to agencies that offer rental assistance, housing information services or residential facilities. Organizations awarded grants for 2013 include Christian Community Health Center, Pilsen Wellness Center, Housing Opportunities for Women and the AIDS Foundation of Chicago.

Public health officials say there are more than 22,000 Chicago residents living with HIV.

The grants are provided by HUD's Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS program.

Digitizing the fight against HIV

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 14:35:00 -0600

Prince Coleman watches an online soap opera. The lead characters are entangled in tricky love affairs.

This story line focuses on young gay and bisexual men—men like Coleman. One character tries to guess if his new lover is HIV positive—a dangerous practice.

“In the gay community a lot people do hook ups,” Coleman said. “It’s always sex first and then get to know each other later. And I think that where we go wrong.”

The video is part of a study by Northwestern University researchers looking at how effective online interventions are in reinforcing safe sex practices to young, gay and bisexual men. Northwestern took the message to where this digital-savvy demographic feels most comfortable—the internet.

Getting that information to young African-American men is especially vital since new HIV infection rates for this group jumped nearly 50% between 2006 and 2009. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, black men had the highest rate of new HIV infections of all groups studied.

“We don’t really know why all the reasons in this particular group HIV is increasing,” said Dr. Brian Mustanski, professor at Northwestern’s department of medical social sciences. He led the study conducted by IMPACT— The Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender Health and Development Program. This group focuses on research aimed at eliminating physical and mental health disparities experienced by the LGBT community.

“We know they are less likely to get relevant sex education in schools,” Mustanski said. “We know their parents are less likely to talk to them about sexual health, sexual prevention than other kids. And so we really need to find ways to reach them with this important information.”

The study involves a program called “Keep It Up” and includes different online modules. Along with the soap opera, there’s a video game and short documentaries on gay relationships. Each delivers prevention messages, including always use a condom, and never assume a partner is HIV negative.

To find participants, IMPACT partnered with clinics that do HIV testing around Chicago.

“They had to come in for their HIV test. So they were already concerned about their health,” said Jill Dispenza, director of HIV testing at Chicago’s Center on Halsted.

Once a man’s tests came back negative, staffers offered one-on-one counseling. If these men were between 18 and 24, they were invited to join the study.

The online video game is a virtual reality club and one of the more popular activities.
Players can order drinks in the lounge or pick up a guy on the dance floor.

“There are a lot of objects you interact with in the club that teach you different information about HIV prevention,” Mustanski said.

Each time a player makes a decision for safer sex, the reward is condoms—which IMPACT then sends participants in the mail.

“It’s a fun game but it’s consistent, important fact-based messages that they’re getting in a really fun way though it doesn’t feel like someone is lecturing them,” Dispenza said.

The study’s results are under review for publication. But early findings are hopeful.

“We found there was almost a 50% reduction in HIV risk behaviors of those men in the keep it up intervention compared to those in the control group,” Mustanski said.

Following President Obama’s lead in placing disease prevention as a national priority
Chicago’s Department of Health is following suit. Last month, the City granted $5 million in HIV prevention funds throughout the city.

“There are 20,391 residents living with HIV in Chicago,” said Dr. Bechara Chourair, the city’s public health commissioner. “We also think there is around 5,000 more but they aren’t aware of their status. So we know there are over 25,000 residents living with HIV in Chicago.”

As part of the prevention program, the city granted $225,000 to Center on Halsted, allowing the Keep It Up program to continue.

“It focuses a lot of innovation and social media. And it’s a very strong method to reach out to these young men who have sex with men population that we want to reach out to,” Chourair said.

Mustanski hopes it is a first step toward allowing the program to continue throughout Chicago….and eventually rolling it out nationally, allowing others to view the soap opera that Coleman watched.

The video shows what young men can face in their relationships and how these issues affect their safe sex choices. In the story where a man assumes his partner is HIV negative, he finds out the hard way that his new lover is not.

“And that’s the kind of dangerous assumptions that people can make in relationships that it’s someone else’s job to bring up HIV,” Mustanski said.

For Colman, the story line hit home.

“It actually felt like I knew the guys. I was there, was maybe in a situation where I was seeing someone who was in a situation like that,” he said. “So now, every time I meet a guy or want to hook up with a guy I will definitely want to ask those questions first. And I will always use protection.”

In Nigeria, groups help 'discordant couples'

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 16:57:00 -0500

Coping with news that you’re HIV positive is a traumatic process. It’s even harder if your partner walks out on you.

In Nigeria, women are especially vulnerable. There are, however, a growing number support groups counseling so-called “discordant couples” on how to live positively. Richard Lough reports from Lagos. (Some names have been changed to protect sources.)

This story originally aired on the World Vision Report. We got it from the Public Radio Exchange.

Worldview for 10.14.11

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:47:00 -0500

Last month in Lagos, statesmen, political scientists, lawyers and civil society groups gathered at a conference to examine the current state of Nigerian politics and to honor Northwestern University professor Richard Joseph for his landmark book Democracy and Prebendal Politics in Nigeria: The Fall of the Second Republic. Jerome caught up with Joseph to talk about where Africa’s most populous nation is heading. And, we learn about a growing number of support groups in Nigeria for HIV-positive adults whose partners abandoned them. Also, in August 1972, the dictator Idi Amin announced that all Asians had 90 days to leave Uganda. We hear from Ugandan Asians who remember the traumatic exodus.

Global Activism: 'Malawi Matters' uses creativity to educate on HIV and AIDS

Thu, 21 Jul 2011 16:31:00 -0500

Every Thursday on Global Activism we hear about an individual who's trying to make the world a better place.

Today we talk to Phyllis Wezeman, an adjunct professor at the University of Notre Dame and executive director of Malawi Matters, whose mission is to develop culturally-inspired HIV and AIDS education in the Southeast African nation. She’s also author of the new book Through the Heart: Creative Methods of HIV and AIDS Education, a handbook of activities and learning experiences that enable children and adults to understand the disease.

Chicago Public Media (WBEZ) has not independently investigated any persons or organizations that appear on the Global Activism series and does not endorse any such person or organization.

Park Hyatt strikers decry outsourcing; hotel turns on heaters

Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:36:00 -0500

The main entrance of an upscale hotel in downtown Chicago was sweltering Thursday morning — and not just because of the rising sun and the week’s heat wave. As pickets marched under the Park Hyatt’s glass awning, the inn switched on 10 heat lamps installed to warm guests in the dead of winter.

The picketing began a daylong strike in which dozens of Park Hyatt employees walked off their jobs at 7 a.m.

Their union, UNITE HERE, is trying to put pressure on Hyatt Hotels Corp. during negotiations to replace Chicago-area contracts that expired almost two years ago. The union represents about 1,800 workers at the Park Hyatt, Hyatt Regency Chicago, Hyatt Regency McCormick Place and Hyatt Regency O’Hare.

The company has agreed to match wages and benefits spelled out in four-year contracts that UNITE HERE reached this year for Chicago employees of two other hotel chains, Hilton Worldwide and Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide Inc.

UNITE HERE says the Hyatt negotiations are stuck on the company’s ability to outsource work to nonunion firms.

“If they replace me, it doesn’t matter how good the benefits are because I’ll be out of a job,” says Park Hyatt restaurant server Gabriel Carrasquillo, a picket captain. “I’m HIV-positive so I have a lot of medical expenses. Without these health benefits, I wouldn’t be able to have the care that I have today.”

UNITE HERE says another contentious point is Hyatt’s housekeeping workloads, which the union calls hazardous. The union funded a peer-reviewed study, published last year in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine, that placed Hyatt fourth among the top five U.S. hotel chains for workplace safety.

Hyatt responded by commissioning a critique from an occupational health expert who concluded that the study’s authors “have not disrupted the conventional wisdom that housekeeping tasks are not inherently hazardous.”

Hyatt accuses UNITE HERE of holding up the Chicago talks to pressure the company to recognize the union at hotels in four other cities. “Instead of acting in the best interests of its members, the union is using them to grow its membership,” says Farley Kern, Hyatt’s vice president of corporate communications.

The strike was the fourth work stoppage to hit a Chicago-area Hyatt since May 2010. Park Hyatt’s reservations desk said the hotel’s 198 rooms were booked solid Thursday morning. Kern insisted the strike would not affect guests because managers were filling in.

The company's next bargaining session with UNITE HERE is Monday.

Helena Bushong reflects on life with HIV

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 13:30:00 -0500

Chicagoans living with HIV and AIDS need resources from places like the AIDS Foundation of Chicagom, and Helena Bushong is one of those Chicagoans. Bushong is HIV positive.

She’s featured in Aging POZitively, a new documentary which follows three older Chicagoans living with the disease. She joined Eight Forty-Eight to talk about the film, and her life with HIV.

Aging POZitively is directed by Dennis Belagorsky.

Music Button: Rubberoom, "Trial of the Vampire" (instrumental version), from the release Architechnology (Sub Verse)

Taking a look at the history and future of HIV/AIDS

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 13:19:00 -0500

Thirty years ago scientists discovered the first cases of AIDS in the U.S. At that point there weren’t even names for the disease, and contracting the HIV virus was in virtually every case a death sentence.

Medical advancements have changed that prognosis, but for those living with the disease, HIV/AIDS is still a struggle involving physical side effects and social attitudes. There are organizations that distribute federal, state and local resources. And many work to educate and prevent further spread of the disease.

One of those organizations is the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. David Ernesto Munar is president and CEO there, and he joined Eight Forty-Eight to look at the history and future of HIV and AIDS.

Music Button: Karsh Kale, "Island," from the release Cinema (Six Degrees)

Dear Chicago: Fight the AIDS epidemic

Mon, 21 Mar 2011 10:50:00 -0500

The struggle against AIDS may be global, but the City of Chicago plays its part in the fight. Over 20,000 Chicagoans suffer from the disease, according to statistics released by the Department of Public Health in November of 2010. City government may not dedicate dollars toward the kind of medical research that could someday lead to a vaccine or cure, but it does funnel money to local groups that provide testing, prevention, education, and treatment. The city set aside nearly $4.78 million in last year’s budget to combat HIV and AIDS.

A statement on the city’s website says that HIV/AIDS funding is designed to “serve communities in greatest need.” But that doesn’t square with everyone’s perception of how resources are allocated.

Keith McCoy, 41, for example, says he is frustrated by how much city money goes to groups on the North Side – groups he calls “politically connected.” McCoy is the treasurer of Windy City LGBT Black Pride, an advocacy group that works primarily with African-American gays and lesbians who live on the South Side. He estimates that his group receives between $6,000 and $10,000 annually in city funding, the bulk of which is spent on a yearly event in Sherman Park where they provide HIV testing to surrounding South Side neighborhoods.

Here, McCoy explains why he wants the new mayor and city council to ensure that the bulk of city money goes to support communities hardest hit by HIV and AIDS.

As of publication, the Chicago Department of Public Health did not return WBEZ’s calls for comment.

Dear Chicago is a project of WBEZ’s Partnerships Program. Keith McCoy was nominated for the series by Affinity Community Services, a social justice organization that serves the African-American LGBTQ community in Chicago.