The 15 States Most Likely to Have an HIV Outbreak

Is your hometown at risk of an HIV or hep C outbreak? 

In 2015, nearly 40,000 people in the United States were diagnosed with HIV. Of that number, 6 percent were attributed to injection drug use. And according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, if the current rates continue 1 in 23 women and 1 in 36 men who inject drugs will be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetime. That’s a scary number. 

After the outbreak in Austin, Indiana — where nearly 200 people were infected with HIV because of injection drug use in only a few weeks — governors around the nation are currently looking to avoid vice president-elect Mike Pence's (and former Indiana governor) mistake. 

During Pence's leadership, the outbreak escalated to become one of the biggest HIV outbreaks in American history. Because of opioid addiction rates, the lack of HIV prevention, limited addiction and recovery options, and (until recently) no needle exchange programs, infection rates skyrocketed at an unprecedented rate.  

The CDC recently came out with a list of 220 counties across the country where outbreaks of HIV and hepatitis C among injection drug users and others may occur because of similar circumstances. Researchers used indicators such as drug overdose deaths, prescription opioid sales, per capita income, white, non-Hispanic race/ethnicity, unemployment, and buprenorphine prescribing potential by waver to determine which regions are more likely to experience an outbreak. To see the full list of counties, click HERE. 

Click through the slides to see if your county is on the list: