Upon my first investigation of AIDS in Montgomery County, Maryland, I studied where the disease is prevalent, who is currently and who is becoming infected, and finally the mode of transmission: how these individuals are contracting the illness. I discovered in this growing suburb of Washington, D.C. actually a quarter of the zip codes within the county demonstrated an AIDS rate higher than the national rate of 339 cases per 100,000 people. After scrutinizing these various “hot” locations I came to the understanding that some towns exhibiting high AIDS rates as apparent in Silver Spring to be the result of the close proximity to the district which might parallel AIDS rates of the city. Germantown and Gaithersburg, however, remain an anomaly as a relatively affluent area, and thus I examined who and how these persons were being infected. The data presents a clear AIDS crisis within the black community in Montgomery County, but with approximately 42% contracting the disease through male-to-male sexual contact and 25% through heterosexual contact the data also points to a problem present in yet not limited to the gay community.

    To understand better what might be causing these different rates around the county I researched rates of AIDS incidence among a variety of demographics and attempted to determine whether a correlation existed between the two variables. All correlations reviewed can be found below in the table:

 

Correlation                                                            Correlation Coefficient

% White Alone                                                                    -0.538

% Black or African American                                              0.623

% Hispanic or Latino                                                            0.527

Per Capita Income in 1999                                                   -0.329

% White Below Poverty Level in 1999                                0.110

% Black Below Poverty Level in 1999                                0.587

% Hispanic or Latino Below Poverty Level in 1999            0.539

% White Enrolled in K-12                                                    -0.470

% Black Enrolled in K-12                                                     0.122

% Hispanic or Latino Enrolled in K-12                               -0.306

% Unmarried Household Partners                                         0.52

% Male Householder and Female Partner                             0.399

% Male Householder and Male Partner                                0.177