HIV infections have sky-rocketed in Chicago as researchers and doctors scramble to understand and contain the epidemic: while transmission of the virus via injectable drug use and heterosexual sex has declined dramatically since the peak of the epidemic in the mid-1980s, infection of men who have sex with men is a different story. New HIV infections in that group plummeted from a peak of about 75,000 per year to less than 18,000 per year by the early 1990s, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the drop was short-lived, and infections currently hover around 30,000 per year. Experts say its younger men, especially young black men, who are driving that trend. Data show that in Chicago, new HIV diagnoses of men who have sex with men and are younger than 30 jumped 76% from 2000 to 2011, and black men account for most of the increase. “It's really hard to maintain the sense of emergency around HIV that many of us remember from the ‘80s and ‘90s," said John Peller, interim president and CEO at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. “We need new ways to communicate with gay men and particularly young gay men about their … sexual health and wellness.”