LOS ANGELES — Public health officials and community leaders gathered in Los Angeles Tuesday to discuss the growing number of Latinos affected by HIV/AIDS.

“Our Community, Our Responsibility: Latinos in Action,” marked the start of a week of AIDS-related activities and free HIV testing and counseling centered around National Latino AIDS Awareness Day, which was Wednesday.

Free HIV testing and counseling will be offered at about 40 sites throughout Los Angeles County through Saturday, according to a statement from the county Department of Public Health.

Latinos make up almost half of all newly diagnosed HIV/AIDS cases in the county and 19 percent nationwide. Studies show that Latino victims are often infected for eight to 10 years before they are tested, increasing the likelihood that they will unknowingly spread the deadly disease, according to the statement.

The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation issued a call for a concerted effort to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and increase testing to prevent new HIV infections in the Latino community. Testing is a key component of HIV prevention, and testing of pregnant women is a critical first step to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV.

“On this national day of awareness, let us make a pledge to increase testing and awareness,” said Pamela W. Barnes, president and CEO of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation. “Together we can end the stigma and dramatically reduce new HIV infections.”

Universal, routine counseling and HIV testing are the most effective ways to increase the number of pregnant women who know their HIV status, and give them the chance to protect their own health and the health of their babies, Barnes said. Testing for HIV is a regular part of pre-natal care and can be done in places as convenient as community health centers. If a woman finds out that she is HIV-positive, she can receive the medicines that can reduce the risk of passing HIV to her baby to less than two percent.

“Medical advances have given us highly effective tools in the fight against HIV, allowing HIV-positive pregnant women to give birth to HIV-negative babies. The first and most powerful step is taking an HIV test, which is an act of courage the whole community can and should support,” Barnes added.

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By LINDSEY TANNER AP

CHICAGO (AP) — Many immigrant children get even less vigorous exercise than their U.S.-born counterparts, the largest study of its kind suggests. Plenty of earlier evidence shows that U.S. children are pretty inactive. The new study of nearly 70,000 children simply found even lower levels of activity among immigrants.

Almost 18 percent of foreign-born children with immigrant parents got no vigorous exercise on any days of the week, and 56 percent didn’t participate in organized sports.

By contrast, 11 percent of U.S.-born children with American parents got no vigorous exercise, and 41 percent didn’t participate in sports.

Given the obesity epidemic and immigrants accounting for about 13 percent of the U.S. population, the authors said it is important to know whether there are ethnic differences in physical activity and sedentary behaviors. They were led by Dr. Gopal Singh, a researcher at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’s Maternal and Child Health Bureau.

Here’s how the researchers explain their results: Immigrant families surveyed were on the whole poorer than nonimmigrants and lived in less safe neighborhoods. That means they likely had less time for exercise and sports, and worse access to places to engage in those activities.

But also, many immigrant parents place a high emphasis on reading, language lessons, studying and other inactive pursuits.

Interestingly, earlier research found that immigrants tend to be less overweight and obese than people born and raised in the United States. That difference tends to wear off with longer exposure to U.S. culture including junk food and television.

The new study also found that immigrant children generally watched less TV than American-born kids, although it did not look at obesity levels.

“Many of our American norms are not healthy,” said Dr. Sarah Armstrong, a Duke University childhood obesity expert. “Could we just teach them our good habits, and not our bad?”

Armstrong said it was the largest study by far to look at the topic.

The study appears in Monday’s Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine. It is based on 2003-04 telephone interviews with parents of children aged 6 to 17, including white, black, Hispanic and Asian immigrants.

Singh said the results among Hispanics were particularly striking: nearly 23 percent of children in families where both parents were born in Spanish-speaking countries got no vigorous physical activity. Also, two-thirds of them didn’t participate in organized sports.

Moreover, among Hispanics, U.S.-born children with foreign-born parents were less active than kids whose parents were both born in the United States. By contrast, among blacks and Asians, U.S.-born children with U.S.-born parents were less active than kids with at least one foreign-born parent.

Dr. Mita Sanghavi Goel of Northwestern University said the results in Hispanics are troubling because of high rates of obesity and diabetes — both related to inactivity — among Hispanics, the nation’s largest immigrant group.

“That just highlights how important it is to intervene early and set healthy lifestyle patterns early on,” Goel said.

Rates for other immigrants who got no vigorous activity were 13 percent for blacks, almost 10 percent for whites and 7 percent for Asians. For no participation in sports, the rates were 49 percent for blacks, 38 percent for Asians and 32 percent for whites.

The authors said more research is needed to verify results in Asians because relatively few Asians were studied.

Among all immigrant groups combined, 65 percent got regular physical activity, versus 75 percent of U.S.-born children whose parents were both born in America.

Regular physical activity was defined as getting at least 20 minutes of vigorous exercise such as running, swimming and basketball at least three days weekly. That was the minimum amount the government recommended when families were surveyed.

Newer government advice recommends an hour of moderate-to-vigorous exercise most days. Just last month, a study found that fewer than a third of U.S. 15-year-olds got even that minimum amount.

The authors acknowledged that parents may not always know exactly how much activity their children get, a potential limitation of the new study.

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When it comes to Latinos and cancer, Ysabel Duron wants to take away the miedo.

It’s that miedo, or fear, that the veteran San Francisco television broadcaster - and a cancer survivor herself - believes is one of the many reasons her community remains in the dark about a disease that will claim the lives of one in five Latinos.

So Duron organized the National Latino Cancer Summit, a conference that starts today in San Francisco, bringing together oncology experts and health care workers from across the country with one main goal: bridge the gap between the Latino community and the experts who are on the cutting edge of cancer research and treatment.

“We are focused on bringing together those researchers with community members who are working in the trenches,” said Duron, who was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma 10 years ago. “It [the information] gets out there on television, but who really hears it and how much do they hear, and how do they understand it?”

Statistically, the incidence of cancer is higher among whites and blacks compared with Latinos.

But Latinos’ survival rates are lower, because their cancers are often diagnosed at an advanced stage, said Dr. Elmer Huerta, president of the American Cancer Society, and the first Latino to hold that position.

About 40 percent of the U.S. Latino population is foreign-born, according to the 2006 American Community Survey. Many of them lack health insurance, Huerta said, or don’t speak English and don’t understand the American medical system, so they wait to see a doctor.

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