The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report Thursday that determined that 4 out of 10 transgender women in seven major U.S. cities had HIV, which the agency said indicated the need for focus HIV prevention and treatment on demographic groups.
The study conducted in 2019 and early 2020 found that 42% of the 1,608 transgender women in Atlanta, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Seattle with a valid test result had HIV.
The report, which the CDC labeled as one of the most comprehensive surveys of transgender women in the United States, found that 62% of black transgender women and 35% of Hispanic or Latino transgender women had HIV. Meanwhile, 17 percent of white transgender women have the disease.
Nearly two-thirds of respondents reported living at a lower or lower poverty level and 17% had no health insurance. More than 4 in 10 people have experienced homelessness in the past year and 17 percent had been in prison.
The research was published days before National Transgender HIV Testing Day on Sunday.
Demetre Daskalakis, director of the CDC’s HIV / AIDS Prevention Division, said in a statement that reducing the number of transgender women with HIV in these cities will require “innovative and comprehensive statusless solutions,” involving ongoing commitment.
“These data provide a clear and compelling picture of the severe HIV toll among transgender women and the social and economic factors (including systemic racism and transphobia) that contribute to this unacceptable burden,” Daskalakis said.
The study determined that 32 percent of non-HIV respondents used pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), a treatment for those at risk for HIV infection through sex or injecting drug use. A total of 34 percent of participants said they had engaged in sex work.
The CDC cited previous studies that concluded that many transgender women may not use PrEP for a variety of reasons, including medical mistrust, lack of marketing that includes transgender, and concerns about how it will interact with hormones. Sixty-seven percent of transgender women in the CDC survey reported taking hormones to assert gender.