Some people just don't like facts. Especially when those facts go against their mainstream media insulated bubble narrative.
Haiti is a hellhole, to put it kindly. And it has nothing to do with "socioeconomic conditions" or "climate change". It has to do with ongoing strife, politicians like the Clintons exploiting the country for decades, and now, full-blown civil war, which mass media have been pooh-poohing as "gang violence". Well, the "gangs" control 80% of Port-au-Prince.
Further, the majority practice voodoo, leading to some dodgy beliefs and health practices. Many Haitians believe voodoo will cure them of HIV and/or AIDS. Don't believe me? Just ask NPR!
So, when JD Vance claimed that Haitians in the US are spreading HIV, we can surmise that he is overwhelmingly likely to be correct with simple math. Haiti is 25th globally in HIV prevalence, the US is 79th. Further, local nurses back up the claim:
The US ranking would be much better but for the data from black Americans:
The rate of new HIV diagnoses per 100,000 among Black adults/adolescents (41.6) was about 8 times that of White people (5.3) and twice that of Latinos (23.4) in 2022 (see Figure 3). The rate for Black men (66.3) was the highest of any race/ethnicity and gender, followed by Latino men (40.8), the second highest group.
--KFF, the leading health policy organization in the US
Furthermore, Haiti has been a hub for different variants of HIV and the migration of the new variants around the world:
Using HIV-1 gene sequences recovered from archival samples from some of the earliest known Haitian AIDS patients, we find that subtype B likely moved from Africa to Haiti in or around 1966 (1962–1970) and then spread there for some years before successfully dispersing elsewhere. A “pandemic” clade, encompassing the vast majority of non-Haitian subtype B infections in the United States and elsewhere around the world, subsequently emerged after a single migration of the virus out of Haiti in or around 1969 (1966–1972). Haiti appears to have the oldest HIV/AIDS epidemic outside sub-Saharan Africa and the most genetically diverse subtype B epidemic, which might present challenges for HIV-1 vaccine design and testing.
--Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS)
So, the likelihood that Haitians are bringing HIV with them in greater prevalence than exists in the US--and bringing different strains that are potentially more difficult to treat--is highly likely.
