National Minority AIDS Council Building Healthier Communities

1994

The CDC introduces the HIV community planning process for work with health departments, which was significant for communities of color. NMAC provides technical assistance.

 

The National Skills Building Conference, in Atlanta, GA, brings together 2500 people and explores the theme, Yesterday's Dream - Tomorrow's Vision.

 

NMAC launches the Challenges of HIV/AIDS for Women of Color and Their Families initiative to address the devastating impact of the epidemic among women of color.

 

The FDA approves d4T (Zerit), a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor for use in the United States.

 

NMAC produces the 11th International AIDS Candlelight Memorial and Mobilization event in Washington, DC, on May 22. The agency also helps convene the HIV Prevention Community Planning Co-Chairs Meeting.

 

In September, NMAC launches a bilingual social marketing campaign called Live Long Sugar, featuring singing legend and honorary NMAC board chair, Patti LaBelle. Click here to view the PSA. The campaign, produced in Spanish and English, targeted communities of color and encouraged preventative therapy for AIDS related pneumonia.

 

The International AIDS Conference convened for the first time Asia that year, in Japan. Meeting organizers announced that the conference would be held every other year.

The CDC announces that HIV/AIDS is the number one killer of men and women in the US aged 25-44.

1995

NMAC moves into its new headquarters - the transformation of the refurbished
building is nothing less than extraordinary. NMAC celebrates the opening of the
building with an event at the Lincoln Center, in Washington, DC.

 

NMAC continues exploiting new technologies to better serve its constituents, and launches its first website.

 

The agency holds a successful meeting and fundraiser for its grassroots advocacy program, Our Place at the Table, from May 22-23, at the National Press Club,
in Washington, DC.

The National Association of People with AIDS (NAPWA) and its partners hold its first annual National HIV Testing Day (NHTD), on June 27.

 

At the end of the year, on December 7, the FDA approved a new class of drugs for treating HIV called protease inhibitors, including Saquinavir. 3TC (lamivudine; Epivir); a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor, also is approved. The drugs help HIV/AIDS become almost a manageable chronic illness.

 

Olympic diving champion, Greg Louganis, announces he is living with HIV.

 

The U.S. admits that Luc Montagnier, not Robert Gallo, discovered HIV. Both scientists are considered "co-discoverers" of HIV.

 

HIV is cloned by researcher Flossie Wong-Staal.

 

US Senator Jesse Helms (NC) tells the New York Times that AIDS funding should be reduced because homosexuals contract the disease through their "deliberate, disgusting, revolting conduct."

 

The CDC releases comprehensive HIV Health Education and Risk Reduction Guidelines. The project is spearheaded by Susan E. Dietz, Chief of the CDC's Training and Education Branch, Division of STD/HIV Prevention, National Center for Prevention Services. Tim Offutt, one of NMAC's founders contributes to this project as a representative of the San Francisco Department of Health.

 

Project Inform founds the North American Treatment Action Forum (previously the National AIDS Treatment Advocacy Forum or NATAF), which is now sponsored by the National Minority AIDS Council.

 

From 1994-1995, 102,071 people died of AIDS, and another 143,070 were diagnosed with the disease. Notable persons who succumbed to AIDS during this period include: Olympic British figure skater John Curry; writer Randy Shilts; and Pediatric AIDS activist, Elizabeth Glaser. Television personality, Pedro Zamora, best known for being a cast member on MTV's The Real World as well as actors Rick Aviles and Tony Azito, also died. Eric "Easy E." Wright, of the Southern California rap group NWA
died of AIDS-related complications only three weeks after his diagnosis.