Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) – An Analysis of Trends in HIV Diagnoses from 2008 – 2018

Objective: An estimated 1.1 million people are living with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in the United States. Despite over two decades of research, a cure for HIV has not been approved and it remains a pandemic. This research study was conducted to determine the statistical significance in HIV incidence based on diagnoses in 2008 versus 2018; age groups 25-34 years old versus 55+ years old; Black versus Hispanic versus White; male versus female; and geographical location. Methods: This retrospective study was conducted using data from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Atlas Plus data sets, a collection of surveillance data from previous years. Analysis was done using paired t-test for prevalence comparison by year and unpaired t-test for age and sex. ANOVA test was used to compare prevalence by race. Descriptive analysis was done using z-scores to determine differences in HIV rates by state. Results: Incidence by rate from 2008 versus 2018 using a 2-tailed t-test resulted as t50=1.99, P=.052 indicating no statistical significance in incidence in comparison. Analysis of incidence in age groups 25-34 versus 55+ resulted as t50=9.69, P\u3c.001, indicating a statistical significance. Analysis of incidence by race resulted as F2,150=46.23, P\u3c.001, indicating a statistically significant difference between races. Analysis of incidence by sex resulted as t50=7.80, P\u3c.001, indicating a statistically significance difference between males and females. Analysis of incidence in states using descriptive analysis resulted as mean 10.67 (SD 7.21). Outliers include District of Columbia with z-score 3.32 and southern states Florida, Georgia, and Louisiana with z-score 2.07, 2.57,and 2.06 respectively