190 Diagnosed With HIV in Indiana Town Known for Epidemic

Nearly 200 people have been diagnosed with HIV in an Indiana town, where health officials say an opioid drug use epidemic helped spread the virus.

The number of HIV cases in the small rural town of Austin, Indiana has reached 190 since December 2014, when the outbreak began to make headlines, USA Today reports. But the town of about 4,000 people — where drug use is rampant and many live in poverty — is now in recovery after the crisis brought much-needed services, health officials told the newspaper.

There have been only 14 new HIV cases since July 2015. “I think we have a lot of really good things that came out of the HIV outbreak,” Brittany Combs, public health nurse at the Scott County Health Department, told USA Today. “We still have a long way to go.”

[USA Today]