One year after a damning report criticized Baltimore?s public agencies for ignoring the AIDS crisis, some gains have been made, the city?s health officials said.
“I definitely think we?re dealing with a crisis,” Health Commissioner Dr. Joshua Sharfstein said. “We?ve been focusing on substantive collaborations with other agencies that address the needs of AIDS patients, rather than narrowly focusing on AIDS treatment.”
Sharfstein cited increasing HIV/AIDS awareness in initiatives such as the project to end homelessness and work by social services and housing department officials that helps AIDS patients.
The lack of interagency cooperation was a major criticism of a January 2006 report by the Baltimore City Commission on HIV/AIDS that assessed the city?s response to the ongoing state of emergency.
No city agencies, other than the Health Department, established any HIV plan, staffing, funding or point of contact since the state of emergency was declared in 2002, according to that report.
In addition, patchwork funding by private groups and federal and state agencies complicated efforts to plan a coordinated AIDS response, the report stated.
Not much has changed, Sharfstein said.
“Our goal is to have a system where we know what work is being done in different places,” he said. “The problem is we?re not funding all of that activity so we don?t know about everything that?s going on.”
With federal Ryan White Act funding still up in the air for this year, Sharfstein said knowing what the city or other groups can do in the future is guesswork at best.
The Baltimore area remains one of the highest cities in the country for reported cases of AIDS, second only to Miami. Health officials identified 40 HIV infections for every 100,000 people in Baltimore and Towson, according to the Maryland AIDS Administration.
“One positive sign is that our syphilis rates are dropping,” Sharfstein said. “It?s a sign that we?re intervening in a similarly transmitted disease.”
