AIDS Delaware and the Delaware HIV Consortium host the 37th annual AIDS Walk Delaware Saturday, September 16.
AIDS Delaware and the Delaware HIV Consortium host the event to raise funds to help provide free, rapid HIV testing, medical case management services, HIV-specific mental health counseling, HIV education, prevention programs, housing, and transportation services.
AIDS Delaware Director of Development & Marketing John Beckley says there have been remarkable improvements since AIDS appeared almost 50 years ago.
“Fortunately it’s a very treatable and manageable disease, if you have insurance, if you have the medication you need and you stay on the medication.”
But AIDS Delaware and the Delaware HIV Consortium are concerned attention to the disease has waned. So this year’s theme - Reignite the Community - seeks to remind Delawareans that over 4000 people are currently in treatment in the First State.
Beckley says see the walk as a way to remind people AIDS is still a daily reality for many.
“Close to 4000 people in the state of Delaware that are HIV positive. They estimate that there’s another ten percent that don’t know, their status - that they are positive. So there is a need.”
Delaware’s first case of AIDS was diagnosed in 1981. This year’s Walk will also celebrate and honor several in the First State who have fought HIV and AIDS in the years since.
Saturday’s event kicks off at 10am in Wilmington’s Brandywine Park and at Rehoboth Beach’s Grove Park.
Information on registering to walk to to donate can be found at AIDSWalkDelaware.org
