Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1988. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
The Associated Press; Wednesday July 20, 1988
But city Health Commissioner Dr. Stephen Joseph said the lower figure does not mean there will be fewer AIDS cases than had been projected. And he said there should be no reduction in funding to fight the disease.
Joseph said he informed the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta of the city's revision Tuesday morning. "Since New York represents 23 percent of the AIDS cases nationally, if they accept our methodology it will make some changes in their estimates."
The Atlanta agency, which based its estimates on the same data New York previously used, estimates that 1 million to 1.5 million Americans are infected with the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV.
"It's really too early to tell if it will affect our figures," agency spokesman Charles Fallis said. "At this point, we're sticking with what we originally said."
The revision in the New York City estimates came just two months after the city released a five-year master plan based on the old figure. The city plans to spend $334 million in AIDS prevention, education and services this year.
"The new estimate today will not affect at all expenditures either in prevention or in services," Joseph said.
The city estimates there will be 43,000 AIDS cases in New York by 1991. Joseph said that figure was "based on trends of past and current AIDS cases which we are quite confident are accurate." The same cannot be said of the number of people infected with the HIV virus. Joseph said that figure always has been "just an estimate . . . and one that at times varies widely."
The new figure for the total number of New Yorkers believed to be infected with HIV is based on recent studies in San Francisco on the number of HIV-infected homosexuals there.
Joseph said it is assumed that the rate of infection is similar in the two cities.
There are 7,499 gay men in New York City with AIDS and 4,071 in San Francisco.
Using that ratio and data that estimates there are 27,517 homosexual and bisexual men infected with the HIV virus in San Francisco, officials theorize there are an estimated 50,000 HIV-infected gay men in New York City, rather than the previously estimated 200,000 to 250,000.
Intravenous drug users and other HIV high-risk groups constitute the rest of the new estimate. The number is significant because most health officials now agree that nearly all of those carrying the HIV virus will get AIDS.
The higher figures, which the city has been using for nearly three years, are based on decades-old data from the research of Alfred Charles Kinsey that estimated that one out of 10 men engaged in homosexual behavior, and on sample surveys indicating there was a 50 percent HIV infection rate among homosexual men.
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