ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book is concerned with Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and the survival of communities. It delineates the limits of traditional public health strategies in tackling the epidemic, and suggests additional avenues for action. The book analyzes the epidemic’s grip on the city’s poorest communities and its dire implications for their future. It argues that populations at risk are created by socioeconomic conditions and in turn are better defined by social characteristics than by biological susceptibilities. The book explores how the AIDS epidemic has intersected with concurrent crises that already threaten community survival in that beleaguered city. It provides examples of successful community-based AIDS interventions in the South Bronx that draw on the often untapped strengths of extended family networks among the urban poor.
