In This Issue

Over the past five years in the United States, the rates of new HIV infections and HIV transmissions have declined; however, these improvements have fallen short of the goals set in the National HIV/AIDS Strategy and have not occurred among Black gay and bisexual men. As we have cautioned here many times in the past, scaling up care and treatment isn't enough. Read on to learn more about a recent analysis of CDC data and what steps the researchers recommend for the future.

Preliminary surveillance data released by the CDC has found that deaths from hepatitis C not only reached an all-time high, but also surpassed the number of deaths from 60 other infectious diseases, including HIV. We run a report from the CDC newsroom.

We continue to share several stories our friends at Kaiser Health News have run about Baltimore to mark the anniversary of last year's uprising. In this issue we run a story on the state's proposal to provide thousands of newly released inmates with temporary Medicaid coverage, a step that would not only help provide people with the healthcare they deserve but could help improve treatment and prevention of HIV and hep C.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has started a new initiative to help people new to health insurance coverage understand their options and connect with the provider that's right for them. And hoping to stop young LGBT adults from smoking, the FDA has launched a targeted stop-smoking campaign.

Finally, today Kentucky and Oregon head to the polls. Please remember to vote!

Yours in the struggle,

Phill