June 27 is National HIV testing day: Know your status

June 26, 8:13 AMDC Healthy Living ExaminerMolly Borchers

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(Photo: BusinessWire).

The YWCA USA and the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is marking National HIV Testing Day on June 27.

Need any more reason to get tested? According to the District's 2008 AIDS/HIV epidemiology report released earlier this year, at least 3 percent of DC's residents are HIV positive.  That's the highest figure in the nation and puts DC 's rate on par with West Africa.  Further, estimates range that as many as one in two people in DC are infected and don't know it.

These statistics are a sobering reminder that we all need to know our status. It is a collective responsibility to take the preventative measures necessary to protect ourselves and others from the epidemic.

Who's at most risk?  Men having sex with men has remained the disease's leading mode of transmission. Heterosexual transmission and injection drug use closely follow, the report says. Three percent of black women carry the virus, partly a result of the increase in heterosexual transmissions. Only one of the city's eight wards — an affluent neighborhood in northwest D.C. — has a rate of infection below the 1% epidemic threshold.

In conjunction with National HIV Testing Day, DC City Council Chairman Vincent Gray and Council Member David Catania will host an HIV testing and awareness event for the community and District government employees on Monday, June 29th from 10 AM to 2 PM at the Wilson Building, 1350 Pennsylvania Avenue NW.  The event will feature free HIV testing and counseling, as well as information about prevention and care.  For more information, call 202-724-8170 or email tterry@dccouncil.us.

So go out and get tested tomorrow!  Wanna know more?  Here are some resources: 

• To find nearby confidential or anonymous HIV testing locations, people can go online to www.hivtest.org, call toll free 800-232-4636, or send a text message with their zip codes to KNOWIT (566948).
• To see a comprehensive listing of free test centers in the district, click here. 
• To learn more about DC's HIV/AIDS prevention services, HIV counseling, condom and clean needle distribution programs and more, click here.