According to state officials, Oregon is one of four applicants nationwide to receive the grant (Palmer, Eugene Register-Guard, 11/1).
According to the Oregonian, the funding will be used to provide services to as many as 30 HIV-positive residents of the five-county Portland metropolitan area, as well as 20 people living with the disease in eight other counties along the Interstate 5 corridor. The two areas have the state's highest concentration of people living with HIV/AIDS, the Oregonian reports. The treatment program will allocate the funding to Cascadia Behavioral Healthcare, which will provide mental health services, and Cascade AIDS Project, which will provide housing support (Colburn, Oregonian, 11/1). According to Victor Fox, manager of the state treatment program, about 4,000 people are living with the disease in Oregon, but other estimates indicate that an additional 2,000 people in the state might be HIV-positive. Health experts estimate that as many as 60% of those living with the disease experience some form of mental illness, the Register-Guard reports (Eugene Register-Guard, 11/1). If the program is successful, HUD might replicate it in other states, Fox said.