As Bernadette Berzoza watched AIDS ravage her husband, she was certain that the virus, already dormant in her bloodstream, would attack her with the same ferocity and leave their children without parents.

Nearly two decades later, Berzoza, 46, continues to fight the virus and educate the public about its deadly effects and the stigma that surrounds it.

Today, she was among those attending a World AIDS Day rally at the state Capitol.

 

"I want people to understand people living with HIV are like everybody else," said Berzoza, who found out she was HIV positive in 1989 and was diagnosed with full-blown AIDS a few years later.

"I was a mother; I had children. I loved the man I was with. He had a drug problem, I know he didn't

Worldwide, an estimated 33 million people were living with HIV/AIDS in 2007, 2.1 million of them children, according to the World Health Organization. In the same year, 2.1 million people died of AIDS-related illnesses.

There are 11,000 Coloradans living with HIV/AIDS, Lt. Gov. Barbara O'Brien told the crowd.

In the United States alone, more than 1.1 million adults and adolescents had HIV at the end of 2006, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Drug users such as Berzoza's husband — who died at age 28 — made up 19 percent of all people living with HIV in the United States in 2006, according to a CDC study that was released in October.

The rate of HIV among black women was 18 times that of white women, and for Latino women, it was four times that of white women.

Berzoza co-founded Sisters of Color United for Education, an organization dedicated to educating minority women about their increased health risks.

She and others who have had the virus for years survive because of drugs that were introduced after her husband died. At one time, she was taking 33 pills each day, a number that has since been reduced

Friends hug after the World AIDS Day gathering in Denver. (THE DENVER POST | HELEN H. RICHARDSON)

Like Berzoza, many women contract the virus from sexual partners infected through intravenous drug use.

In the 1980s, an HIV diagnosis was equivalent to a death sentence. Little was known about the disease, and many people believed those who had it had brought it on themselves.

Frightened that she would be ostracized if people knew she was infected, Berzoza kept her HIV status to herself.

But in 1994, she received a call from a terrified 15-year-old girl who had just tested positive for the virus. "I had to get out and say, 'We have to do something.' I became a voice for other people who are living in shame and guilt," Berzoza said.

The stigma attached to the disease hasn't been eradicated, said Belinda García, who founded Sisters of Color with Berzoza.

Many women with HIV/AIDS are raising children even as they try to overcome prejudice that surrounds it, said García.

"My son is 24; my daughter will be 23. I have two grandchildren. My children have been my rock," said Berzoza.

But it hasn't been easy for them, she added. "It has been very hard on them because we had to keep it secret for a long time."

Tom McGhee: 303-954-1671 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it