LOS ANGELES (AP) - Magic Johnson's normally camera-shy wife Cookie is emerging as a spokeswoman to urge black women to get
tested for HIV.

Cookie Johnson, who was two months pregnant when her husband
tested positive for HIV in 1991, is appearing with the former LA Lakers star in a five-year, $60 million public service campaign funded by drug firm Abbott, which manufactures AIDS and HIV drugs. The public-service ads are directed by moviemaker Spike Lee.

Almost a third of cases diagnosed among blacks in 2006 were women, double the rate for white women, according to the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation.

Cookie Johnson, who tested negative for the virus, says part of the community still has the attitude that "it can't happen to me."
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Information from: Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

AP-NY-07-06-08 1317EDT