CDC Observes National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day
March 8, 2013 March 10 is National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS
Awareness Day (NWGHAAD), a time when organizations and
communities across the United States come together to offer
support, encourage discussion, and teach women and girls about
the prevention of HIV, the importance of getting tested, and how
to live with and manage HIV infection. NWGHAAD is coordinated by
the Office on Women's Health within the Office of the Assistant
Secretary for Health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services. HIV is a significant problem for women. Over a quarter
of a million (an estimated 279,100) women and adolescent girls
were living with HIV at the end of 2009. In 2011, women and
adolescent girls ages 13 and older accounted for 21% of the
estimated 49,273 diagnoses of HIV infection in the United
States; heterosexual contact accounted for 86% of diagnosed
infections. Further, 15% of women and adolescent girls living
with HIV do not know they are infected,