June 5, 1981 – CDC reports first known cases of what we now call AIDS in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.* (June 5, 1981 MMWR cover)
1988-1990 For the first time, the number of new infections among African-Americans exceeds the number of infections in whites and remains that way ever since that time* (Image: Number of New HIV infections by Race/Ethnicity 1977-2006)
1991 – NBA legend Earvin “Magic” Johnson announces that he is HIV-positive (Image: Magic Johnson 1991 Press Conference)
1992 – Tennis star Arthur Ashe announces he has contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion. He died in February 1993 at age 50. (TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP/Getty Images)
1993 — Denzel Washington stars in Philadelphia, one of the first mainstream Hollywood films to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic. (File Photo)
December 1994 – Rae Lewis Thornton becomes the first HIV-positive African-American woman to tell her story for a national publication in Essence magazine (Image: 12/94 Essence cover)
1995 – Rapper Eazy-E died of AIDS one month after being diagnosed with AIDS and publicly announcing it. (FILE PHOTO)
March 2006 – CDC joins public health partners and African-American leaders to launch the Heightened National Response to the HIV/AIDS Crisis among African-Americans. More than 200 leaders join the effort. (Image: Dozens of African-American leaders at launch of HNR)
June 2006 – CDC recommends routine HIV testing in health care settings for all adults, aged 13-64 (Image: HIV test in action)
April 2009 – The White House partners with CDC to launch Act Against AIDS, the first national HIV awareness campaign in two decades, and the Act Against AIDS Leadership Initiative – a partnership of leading black organizations working together to fight HIV in black communities. (Image: Act Against AIDS campaign creative and launch photos)
April 2009 – At the White House unveiling of the Act Against AIDS campaign, civil rights pioneer Dorothy Height urges African Americans to “talk about HIV, as we talk about jobs, as we talk about housing, as we talk about civil rights.” (Image: NCNW Chair Dorothy Height at AAA launch)
Today: African-Americans, more than any other race, have the highest rates of HIV infection in the nation. Although just 14 percent of the U.S. population, blacks account for nearly half of those living and dying with HIV and AIDS. Among African-Americans, gay and bisexual men are the most affected, followed by heterosexual women. (AP Photo)
From the first AIDS case on June 5, 1981 until now, black Americans have been significantly affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Even though HIV was initially painted as a gay white man’s disease, black Americans were among those early cases, having to visit a house of recovery often to ease their symptoms at first. Now, they account for almost half of people with HIV in the U.S. and nearly half of new infections each year. Take a look through the last three decades at the key moments in the history of HIV/AIDS in the black community.
