Scott Bryan, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokesman, tells The Florida Independent that the conference focused on “high-impact prevention efforts” to “target populations that are at most risk.” The CDC issued a report early this month that shows an “alarming increase” in HIV incidence “among young, black gay and bisexual men” that requires “urgent action.”

Stephen Fallon — executive director of Skills4, which provides community forums and training in areas of health promotion and disease prevention — attended the conference, and tells the Independent in an email:

CDC is going to allocate more of the prevention funding to follow where the epidemic is going (new HIV cases, called incidence). In the past, the model largely favored jurisdictions that had high cumulative cases of AIDS, even if these weren’t necessarily the locations where new HIV infections were occurring or cases of AIDS were still being diagnosed.

This is good news for Florida, which has always been underfunded relative to its overall case rates. In the most recent CDC data (through 2009) the Miami Metropolitan Statistical Area is #1 in both new HIV infections and new AIDS diagnoses. The Miami MSA includes Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties. Within this overall MSA, Ft Lauderdale has the highest new rates, Miami the 2nd highest.

 

CDC is also planning to focus more on gay/bisexual men (MSM), particularly young men of color. They have a new funding announcement that’s being reviewed now.

 

Dr. Ronald Valdiserri, deputy assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, wrote on Monday: ”Without minimizing positive outcomes, several presenters – federal and non-federal alike – acknowledged that these are challenging times for HIV prevention activities in light of a federal discretionary spending freeze and state and local budget cuts that have resulted in the loss of an estimated 45,000 public health jobs and serious reductions in a variety of public health programs.”

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