Chicago Tribune (CT) - SUNDAY, December 12, 1993 Edition: FINAL EDITION Section: NEWS Page: 1 Word Count: 1,434
Jerry Thomas, Tribune Staff Writer.

A graphic Sunday incorrectly stated that HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) is a major killer of young women. The correct statement is that AIDS (acquired immune deficiency sydrome) or complications from HIV infections are a major killer. The Tribune regrets the error.

NEWARK, N.J. - On a warm June evening in 1992, Lorraine Little was summoned to St. Michael's Hospital. Her fiance, Abdul Ali, had been rushed there with a temperature of 106.

Ali, a 42-year-old construction worker and former heroin addict, was diagnosed as having AIDS. Little, the mother of Ali's 2-year-old son, was so overwhelmed by the news that she stormed from his room and did not return until the next day.

"It was devastating when I found out," she said. "I didn't want it." Earlier this year, Little, 32, learned the virus had started to consume her, too.Once a disease that affected mostly homosexual men and intravenous drug users, AIDS now is infecting women at a faster rate than any other group, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

Nationally, AIDS has become the fourth leading cause of death among U.S. women between the ages of 25 and 44, behind cancer, accidental injury and heart disease. In Newark, however, AIDS is the No. 1 cause of death for women in that age group.

In 1992, 120 women age 25-44 died of AIDS in Newark-a city of 268,000 residents-while 110 died of heart disease and 86 died of cancer, city health officials said. (By comparison, in the state of Illinois, with a population of 11.5 million, 115 women of all age groups died of AIDS in that year.) Newark's crisis will get worse. Another 1,000 women in the city have AIDS, and it is assumed that thousands more are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Nationally, nearly 15,000 new cases of AIDS were reported among women in the last year, more than double the 6,200 cases reported in the previous 12-month period.

In all, 43,000 American women have been diagnosed with AIDS (out of a total of 340,000 cases). But that is just the tip of the iceberg. The CDC estimates another 80,000 U.S. women are HIV positive. Over the next decade, the CDC says, these women will leave 150,000 children motherless; 30 percent of those children will be HIV infected.

"I send children down to grandparents in Georgia and Puerto Rico," said Dr. Anita Vaughn, medical director of the Newark Community Health Center on Ludlow Street. "We find foster homes for the children, and we help the women write wills," to specify who will take care of their kids when they die.

"You are looking at the complete dissolution of the family," said Bruce Siegel, New Jersey's health commissioner. "We have got to empower women to tell their partners, 'I will not have sex with you if you do not use a condom.' "

In Newark, New Jersey's largest city, most of the women with AIDS are African-American and Latina. Some are IV drug users, but most are wives or girlfriends of men infected with the virus. Many of the victims are poor and unemployed, but some are middle class and professional.

In July, Deborah Marshall, a 34-year-old employee of the Prudential Life Insurance Co., found out she was HIV positive. She doesn't know how she got the virus. Her husband of two years tested negative. Neither of them uses drugs. She said she has been faithful during their five-year relationship.

"He was there when the doctor told me," said Marshall, a polished, soft-spoken woman. "Now he does not trust me."

Beverly Smith, 36, and Kathy Remillard, 25, said they contracted the virus from their husbands, who were IV drug users.

Remillard, who is white, said she found out her 39-year-old husband had AIDS six months after their marriage in 1986. Still, they conceived three children. Remillard found out she was HIV positive in 1991; her youngest child also has the virus. Her husband died in June.

"I loved him; I said the only way I was going to go away from him was in a pine box," said Remillard, explaining why she placed herself at risk.

Smith, who has four daughters, found out she was HIV positive in 1988, the second year of her marriage. She is still angry that her husband, who died in 1989, did not tell her he had the disease; she found out only after his former girlfriend died of AIDS.

Newark's economic and social conditions have a lot to do with why AIDS has taken such a toll on its women. Among U.S. cities of more than 100,000, Newark is the 11th poorest. Almost 71,000 of its residents-26 percent-live below the poverty line, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

When wealth and jobs were lost, mainly because of the 1967 riots, drugs were pumped into the city, health officials and social workers say. Many of Newark's addicts and prostitutes shoot heroin. The needles are shared, and so is HIV. Many poor women don't get adequate health care or take precautions to avoid sexually transmitted diseases, health officials say. By the time the women are tested for AIDS, many are in the late stages of the disease. (Women with AIDS also tend to deteriorate faster than men, officials say.)

Newark offers a portrait of what will happen in Chicago and other communities if no effective treatment for AIDS is found soon.

"The mortality rate will continue to rise," said Dr. Sue Chu, an epidemiologist for the CDC. "These death rates reflect infection from many years ago-it takes some 10 years for the disease to emerge."

The mortality rate will climb because drug use is at an all-time high, Chu said. And despite a campaign to promote abstinence and safe sex, sexual activity is on the rise among teen girls, and many don't use condoms.

Perhaps most alarming, new studies show extremely high rates of sexually transmitted diseases among young adults-another risk factor for AIDS.

"Right now, what is showing up is a lot of deaths in women on the Eastern seaboard," Chu said. "But we are seeing shifts in the infection patterns (from women infecting themselves through IV drug use to women being infected through heterosexual contact) in the South, and in places like Chicago."

In Newark, meanwhile, AIDS has changed the texture of daily life for many women.

In the Newark Community Health Center, Dr. Vaughn sees patients in her small office. The clinic is in the midst of the towering Dayton Street projects, home to many of the city's poor and ill.

It's the day after Thanksgiving, but Vaughn's schedule is full. One after another, AIDS patients come in for shots, tests, prescriptions.

At 1 p.m., a weekly support group for women with AIDS meets in the center. On this cloudy, chilly afternoon, about a dozen show up. It is Vaughn's birthday, and they present her with a bouquet of red leather roses. Then, as they do every Friday, they share their stories.

The women say they survive by adopting a healthier lifestyle, and by blocking out negative thoughts. "I don't wake up every day saying I'm HIV positive," said Gail Gibson, a 39-year-old former social worker. "I wake up and smell the roses. I'm more spiritual."

Smith said she attends church, as does Ronald Coleman, the 37-year-old man she plans to marry this month. Coleman, a one-time heroin addict, also is HIV positive.

"I just put it in God's hand," Smith said. "I'm getting healthier and healthier every day."

In October, Abdul Ali and Lorraine Little got married.

Sitting on the sofa in their modest, three-bedroom apartment, her baby on her lap, Little said she has given up cocaine and changed her eating habits. Having the virus, she said, "really helped me."

AIDS was no stranger to Little, having claimed a brother and a cousin a few months before Ali was diagnosed.

"I stopped the drugs because it was killing me," she said. "I had the virus; it made me take really good care of myself." She said she wished others would take care of themselves.

"Newark is here because people don't care," Little said. "People say they don't like condoms, but they better like to love them.

"Too many people are dying."

CAPTION: GRAPHIC: HIV a major killer of young U.S. women. Source: Centers for Disease Control. Chicago Tribune. See microfilm for complete graphic.

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