The Region - News from Oct. 12, 1986

Long Beach and Chicago will be sites of new AIDS prevention projects sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control, health officials announced. The new programs are part of a $3.7-million grant which will also extend four other projects now operating in Dallas, Denver, Seattle and Albany, N.Y. The pilot projects will conduct mass information drives, testing for AIDS antibodies and counseling. There will also be follow-up studies to determine if high-risk individuals, including homosexuals and intravenous drug users, have abandoned behaviors that researchers believe increase the likelihood that AIDS will be transmitted. The $3.7 million is part of $22 million that the federal CDC is providing states for AIDS prevention programs. At least 25,500 people in the United States have contracted AIDS since 1981, and more than half of them have died.