Brian Skip McClatchey

"We see more than 1,600 patients at this clinic, and Henry Ford (Hospital) has contact with another 1,300," said Brian "Skip" McClatchey, a clinical social worker in the infectious diseases division of Detroit Medical Center.

About a million people nationwide are believed to have AIDS or are carrying the HIV virus that is the precursor to AIDS, according to the Michigan Department of Community Health.More than 6,000 residents of Metro Detroit are living with AIDS, and almost a third are women.

"The hard part is what we don't know.Between 25 and 33 percent of all infected people have never been diagnosed," McClatchey said.