• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now estimate that more than one million Americans are living with HIV. Up to one-third of them do not know they are HIV-positive.
• It's estimated that one in every 20 adults in the District of Columbia is infected with HIV.
• DC has a higher rate of HIV infection than most sub-Saharan African nations.
• DC has the highest rate of new AIDS cases per 100,000 people in the United States -- a rate that is 12 times the national average.
• In DC, the greatest increase in AIDS cases is occurring among people of color, women, injection drug users and through heterosexual contact.
• In DC, African-Americans account for eight out of every 10 cases of AIDS.
• More than 15,000 people in the Washington metropolitan area live with AIDS. Tens of thousands more people are estimated to be infected with HIV.

I think first as a community (DMV) & artists we need to come together and unite to do a better job of educating others about the risk of having unprotected sex. We can obviously see by the numbers that the AIDS risk is definitely real and rising in our community. Part of the problem is a lot of people believe that it will never happen to them or that they are immune, that is not the case at all! I commend networks such as BET and people like Tigger who are dedicated to getting people out to get tested, as well as campaigning for everyone to practice safe sex! Each one teach one! We may not save everyone, but if we can reach/get through to one person, we have done our jobs. So let's do it!

- Dee Woodz

I agree with Dee Woodz The DMV as a whole its Community & Artist's must come together to help educate the people of the DMV. We have a serious problem here In the District of Columbia, 3 percent of the population has been diagnosed with HIV/AIDS, a rate not seen since what was considered the height of the epidemic in the 1990's in San Francisco. According to Shannon Hader The Director of The Department of Health HIV/AIDS Administration In DC, Our rates are higher than West Africa, Prince George's County in Maryland has the second-highest rate of reported HIV/AIDS cases statewide.

The county also has the second-highest rate of sexually transmitted infections, According to County Health Officer Donald Shell adding that only Baltimore is higher in both categories.

I am pleading with everybody to please help fight this severe epidemic before its to late.

Do your part to help practice safe sex and don't share needles.

Dee Woodz said it best Each One Teach One !!!!

- Ju