And a Happy AIDS Day to You Too
Forty Million People are infected with HIV across the globe on this date. Three million of them will die of AIDS this year. Half of those infected live in Africa (which only has 10% of the world's population). The fastest growing infection rate is in the Ukraine.
Twenty years ago I first signed up to work with a local AIDS organization. I worked as a "buddy" to a PWA (person with AIDS). I worked with three buddies before taking a break from this work. I watched them die, as I watched dozens of others in the 80s and 90s die from this disease.
In the 21st century, AIDS is no longer a death sentence for those who have access. To doctors, hospitals, medicines, even the simplist things like a refrigerator to store some meds, or watches to know when to take them. Of that 40 million people who are infected as of this hour - anybody want to take a guess as to how many have access to those things?
The disease that struck fear into the hearts of homophobes across the US is now infecting and killing straight women more than any other group. When rumors persist that having sex with a virgin can "cure" a man of AIDS, when prostitution and drug abuse are treated only as criminal acts, we help those numbers to grow. Passing out condoms in school is not potentially saving a life, it's encouraging kids to have sex. Passing out clean needles to junkies is not stopping AIDS transmission, it's encouraging drug use.
And sticking one's righeous head in the sand as millions continue to die is nothing less than murder.
Twenty years ago I first signed up to work with a local AIDS organization. I worked as a "buddy" to a PWA (person with AIDS). I worked with three buddies before taking a break from this work. I watched them die, as I watched dozens of others in the 80s and 90s die from this disease.
In the 21st century, AIDS is no longer a death sentence for those who have access. To doctors, hospitals, medicines, even the simplist things like a refrigerator to store some meds, or watches to know when to take them. Of that 40 million people who are infected as of this hour - anybody want to take a guess as to how many have access to those things?
The disease that struck fear into the hearts of homophobes across the US is now infecting and killing straight women more than any other group. When rumors persist that having sex with a virgin can "cure" a man of AIDS, when prostitution and drug abuse are treated only as criminal acts, we help those numbers to grow. Passing out condoms in school is not potentially saving a life, it's encouraging kids to have sex. Passing out clean needles to junkies is not stopping AIDS transmission, it's encouraging drug use.
And sticking one's righeous head in the sand as millions continue to die is nothing less than murder.
posted by Anonymous at 5:42 PM
2 Comments:
a nice riff, very a propos. unfortunately, i think a serious effort at making prevention a priority and getting drugs and the necessary accompaniments to places where they are needed most requires the backing of the US government and its formidable resources. And as long as we have an executive branch that is created largely by and for a special interest group in the country--wingnut religious conservatives--i'm afraid we will get more of the same. these people won't even allow discussion of birth control in places where overpopulation is an overwhelming problem...why would they abandon their convictions about condoms for a disease they believe to result from a "lifestyle choice?" it's very hard, if not impossible, to interest these people in facts. they have their own.
these same people appear to love, and support, corporate interests, so there won't be any cheap drugs for export for the time being, either.
we have got to get rid of the people running the country now, and a lot of things stand a chance of improving.
that is all. over and out. end of soapbox.
Blogging means never having to end the soapbox ;)
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