Glenn J. Treisman, MD, PhD

Mental illness is a risk factor for HIV infection. It brings a number of behavioral correlates that put patients at risk for getting infected. As HIV infection worsens, it begins to affect the brain, and cyclical relationship between the disease and mental illness begins.

Most estimates suggest that there are just over a million persons living with HIV/AIDS in the United States. According to CDC data, between 2001 and 2005, an average of 37,127 new cases of HIV infection, HIV infection and later AIDS, and concurrent HIV infection and AIDS were diagnosed each year.