D.C. Officials Lack "Sustained Attention" to HIV/AIDS, Editorial Says

Washington, D.C., officials "yield to no one in their outspokenness" about the spread of HIV/AIDS in the district, but their "high-flown rhetoric ... far exceeds their dismal response" to the epidemic, which affects nearly one in 50 district residents according to a report released last week, a Washington Post editorial says. It is "shameful if not scandalous" that about 10,000 people in the city are living with AIDS even though the district has spent nearly half a billion dollars in federal and local funds over the past eight years to fight the disease. "Where is the leadership necessary to mobilize the civic community ... to speak out candidly and frequently about HIV/AIDS?" the editorial asks. "Sustained attention at the highest level of city government is ... the missing ingredient," the editorial says, adding, "Millions spent with unknown results, more AIDS deaths and untold new infections" are the "proof" (Washington Post, 3/28).

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