Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Indiana is one of only five states in the United States whose HIV rate is increasing statistically.
Kosciusko County ranks 28th out of 92 Indiana counties for all HIV and AIDS cases accumulated since 1985.
"I don't think a lot of people realize that," said Angel Moschel-Foster, AIDS Task Force Inc. outreach services coordinator.
To help educate people about the HIV virus, which causes AIDS, AIDS Task Force Inc., the Kosciusko County Community Foundation and the Kosciusko County Chapter of the American Red Cross are hosting "Get the Facts: HIV in your Community" Wednesday from 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. The seminar will be held at the Foundation office, 102 E. Market St., Warsaw. The seminar is free and open to the public. There is no registration fee.
According to Moschel-Foster, the seminar is the first type of HIV community education held in Kosciusko County. Not all of the seminar will be academic, Moschel-Foster said. Part of the seminar will include facts and statistics.
Topics covered will include HIV and the teen community, substance abuse, the social impacts of HIV and how living with HIV affects individuals and the community. Professionals from agencies from around the state will be speaking, including Indiana State Department of Health epidemiologist Jerry Burkman, Four Counties Counseling Center satellite manager and therapist John George, Social Health Association Community Action Coordinator Paula French and staff and volunteers from the AIDS Task Force Inc.
Members of the local medical community, educators and many others are expected to attend. She said, "We have a variety of people coming. ... This is a test run for doing something like this." Ideally, she said, they want to see this type of seminar spread into other parts of northeast Indiana since northeast Indiana is a "high-risk" area.
Moschel-Foster said French will present an entire section on HIV and the teen community. Anyone who works with or has teens, and teenagers themselves, will particularly benefit from this section of the seminar. For younger people who haven't received HIV education in the classroom yet, this will be "very beneficial" for them, she said.
Moschel-Foster will talk about how HIV began and how it spreads. She said some people still mistakenly believe a person can contract HIV from swimming in a pool with someone who is HIV-positive.
She said now the biggest increase of HIV cases is heterosexual women, particularly women ages 15 to 29. As of June, she said, heterosexuals account for 19 percent of all new cases. The majority of all new HIV infections is through heterosexual contact and in people 20 to 40 years old, "which means they're getting it in their teens or early 20s," said Moschel-Foster.
Injection drug use accounts for only 13 percent of all new cases.
The biggest way to help prevent HIV is to get educated. "Everyone in their own way can become an educator by getting informed and spreading" the information, she said. "Getting the information out there makes a huge difference."
Each part of the seminar has a question-and-answer session built into it. Also, at the end of the seminar, a 20- to 30-minute question-and-answer period also will be held.
"I can't think of a question I haven't been asked yet," said Moschel-Foster.
For more information or to preregister, contact Moschel-Foster at 800-417-3085. People also can register when they show up so they can get a parking pass for the seminar.
She said, "We need to remember this is a human disease and we are all human." Forty million people worldwide are infected with the disease, and sooner or later, everyone will know someone who is infected.
"We want to see as many people attend as possible," she said, as the disease needs to be confronted head-on.
