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Previous studies have shown that people tend to reduce their high-risk sexual behavior when they learn that they are HIV infected (ACC Sep 14 2005). According to the CDC, the proportion of HIV-infected people who are aware of their serostatus has increased in recent years — from 70.5% in 2001 to 74.2% in 2004. Could this increase in awareness be at least partially responsible for the fact that HIV incidence held steady during the same time period, despite an increase in HIV prevalence?
To address this question, researchers devised a mathematical model of the U.S. HIV epidemic from 2001 through 2004 and calculated the number of incident infections that would have occurred had the level of serostatus awareness remained unchanged. The model — b…