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HIV/AIDS: Why Won't it Stop? AIDS is a very complicated infection. It is not only infecting individuals, but it also infecting our society. Until a cur is rach it will continu to page human society. No person will vr b truly saf. Our government nds to kp spending mony on research to develop a cur for AIDS.
To fully understand why our government should continu to send its funds on AIDS research on must first understand AIDS. Noone actually knows where AIDS comes from. Americans say that it originated in Africa. Africans say that the Europeans brought it to Africa. AIDS got its first documented case as late back as the 1950 's on the African continent.
Africa has more documented cases than any where in the world. Scientists predict that three out of every ten sexually active people in Africa carry the AIDS virus. AIDS has become a threat to entire communities there. Scientists believe that the spread of the disease is almost entirely by heterosexual activity, since the amount of male and female infection are about equal. AIDS is a disease that can be spread through traveling. At first the disease was only in North America and Africa.
It is now spreading all over the world. Although there are not as many cases of Aids in America as Africa the disease still exist at an alarming rate. AIDS was not discovered in America until 1981 and not given a name until 1984. In America AIDS is mainly a disease that plagues white males. It seems that most cases of AIDS are due to homosexuality and drug use. When people use drugs that use syringes, such as heroin or steroids they are at high risk.
When one person uses a syringe and then gives it to another person they are sharing their blood. AIDS spreads faster among drug abuses that any other group because they are often careless with their needles (Taylor, 6). Unfortunately these are not the only ways a person can contract AIDS. AIDS can also be brought on by heterosexual activities, with or with out intercourse being involved.
In fact, AIDS among teenagers is quickly becoming a risk group. If there is a cut on or in the anus, vagina, penis, or mouth the disease, if present, will be spread. People can also contract AIDS through blood transfusions and during surgeries involving donor body parts including blood. Right now in the United States scientists are searching for the cure for AIDS in hospitals, universities, and government centers. These people need the funding that our government sends to them. With out it they can not conduct the high tech.
experiments that they conduct. These scientists are looking for a vaccine. A vaccine is generally an injection that helps the immune system develop antibodies that defends the body from organisms that re on the attack. A vaccine is a medicine that is composed of germs or bacteria. It is very difficult to find a magical cure that will only knock off the infected cells and not the living. Right now the only ways scientist and doctors know how to get rid of the virus is to get rid of all of the cells, infected or not.
Unfortunately this can kill a person (Taylor 49). There are approximately one AIDS related deaths every twelve minutes in the United States. Yet there continue to be arguments in our nation that there is too much being spent on AIDS research and development. People think that billion dollar budgets are spent on military actions mainly. On the contrary billions of dollars are spent on medical research and care. Out of these billions medical provisions to elderly, veterans, and the poor are taken.
The rest is left for other organizations and AIDS research is only one of the hundreds that receive this money. Through the governmental grants much progress is made. The question that is often asked: where does AIDS sit on the list of priorities? Does it really deserve as much funding as it gets? Cost alone should not be what keeps the research of AIDS from being a national priority. Research on this virus is just as important as any other research being conducted today in our country.
The delay on such research will not only prevent a vaccine from be created, but it will also cause greater amount of money to be spent in the future. Inflation will eventually become an issue. The people who contract AIDS will only increase in number. The risk categories will also only increase. AIDS will not go away. In the history of medicine only small pox has been illuminated.
AIDS research is not something that a fixed sum of money can be thrown at and hope for a cure. As the medicine progresses so will the cost. The cost of AIDS research is exponential. That must be remembered when the government considers how much money would be spent on it. AIDS must be treated as a disease that will be around for a long time if not forever. Hesitation by the U.
S. government to carry out necessary HIV research would be criminal. - Bruce Flemming HIV remains a highly lethal communicable disease. Despite increased medical management the number of AIDS victims continues to rise each year. Hospital are forced to increase the care and time the spend on making sure nothing in contaminated. Hospitals are also forced to care for more and more AIDS patients. This increases the risks they must take with the disease.
If HIV research continues to be a lower priority in our country's priorities it will be the gay men and women, needle users, sexual partners, and their children who will suffer the price of our negligence to disease control. All men are created equal no matter their life styles. Who should be sentenced to death for a mistake that was made (Daniel 62 - 70). In 1991 271, 000 people were estimated to have AIDS.
Of these people 54, 000 were estimated to not make in another year. 54, 000 people are more than all of the American deaths in World War I and Vietnam War combined. This number is also only an estimate. There could be many more people with the disease that do not even know it yet (Check 69). If a cure is not reach soon the deaths will not they will only continue.
We need our government to continue its efforts at finding a cure. No person should rest until the cure is reached and dispersed around the globe to every corner and slum, no matter how far away. The death count in 1996 was 31, 130, drastically higher than in 1997, when the death count only reached 16, 865 (Holmes 1). This is the lowest amount of deaths caused by AIDS since 1987, the first year it was recorded (Holmes 1). Some experts say this is due to the fact that new drug treatment are being introduced. Donna E.
Shall, Health and Human Services Secretary, says the decline reflects the tremendous power of the new combination therapies... (Holmes 1). AIDS is a disease that does not yet have cure (Day 3) and the situation is not expected to stabilize for several more decades (Cowley 20). This a scary thought, considering the number of people in the world who are infected with the virus. At this time, there is an estimated six million people sick with the AIDS virus, while the number of people infected is approaching twenty million (Cowley 20). These staggering numbers are intensifying the search for a vaccine. Research efforts are truly important in the control and prevention of the AIDS virus and many new experimental drugs are being made available (Kurland 35).
New combination drugs, or cocktails (Forman 102) have been proven to aid in the fight, but there are still doubts. New development in these drugs and vaccines will need financial aid as well as international involvement to order to succeed. Dr. Barry Bloom, of Harvard School of Public Health, feels that vaccines are among the most cost efficient interventions to prevent infectious diseases. One new drug being experimented with is efavirenz, a non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor (Drugs 1).
This drug was brought about ten years ago, when new research found that AIDS was developing a resistance toward any drug used (Drugs 1). In recent cases, efavirenz, when combined with AZT (zidovudine) and lamivudine, was proven to be more affective than a protease inhibitor (Drugs 1). Another drug being experimented with is called T- 20 (Stephenson 1125). This drug is an entry inhibitor that coats a T-Lymphocyte cell, which will stop the HIV stain to entering the cell (Stephenson 1125).
Robert T. School, MD, University of Colorado Health Sciences Center, explains that, the major excitement is that its been shown that [the entry inhibitor] works (Stephenson 1125). The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that one third of HIV positive people in the United States do not know their status (Sheon 1). This is why testing is becoming so important. A simple test will look for antibodies for HIV being made by the body (National), determining if a person is infected. If a person feels he or she has been in contact with the HIV/AIDS virus, the best thing to do is to wait three to six months, which allows for a reliable test result (National).
There are different types of HIV/AIDS tests. The most common in the blood test. Due to modern day technology, people now have a variety of choices. The blood test can either be taken at a clinic with a specialist or at home.
Tests are confidential and anonymous, as well as efficient and affordable. Tests taken at a clinic can range in price from as low as being free, and go up to around forty dollars (National). Results take anywhere from days to weeks to return, depending on the clinics location and how busy it may be (National). A person has the choice to receive results through the mail or even over the phone, and if the test comes back positive, a second test is required to determine whether or not results are inconclusive (National).
Some possible results are positive, negative, intermediate, false positive and false negative. Home tests can cost anywhere from thirty to forty dollars, and are sold over the counter as well as by phone. The sure way to avoid becoming infected with AIDS is to practice safe sex. Safe sex involves many aspects. First of all, a condom should always be used (Kurland 23).
Also, a monogamous relationship will rule out any suspicion of possible infection (Day 5). As we enter the twenty first century, it is our responsibility to protect ourselves. Ignorance in bliss, and it would be true stupidity to throw away our own future. Over the past twenty years, AIDS has increased throughout the worlds population, but luckily, we live in a time where education and science are at its peak. Today, we have the means to find a way to cure this devastating virus, once and for all. Bibliography: Check, William.
AIDS. New York, New York. Chelsea House Publishers, 1988. Day, Lorraine.
AIDS What the Government Isnt Telling You. Palm Desert, New Mexico. Rockford Press, 1999. Daniel, Eileen. Taking Sides.
Guilford, Massachusetts. Dunskin Publishing Group, 1998. Group: Report Names of Those with HIV. The Courier-Journal. 28 September, 1999 sec 2: 1.
Herein, David. Death as a Fact of Life. Toronto, Canada. George J. McLeod Limited. 2000. Justin, Daniel.
Medical Ethics. Englewood. Silver Burdett Press, INC. 1999. Kurland, Morton.
Coping with AIDS. New York, New York. Rosen Publishing Group. 1997. Strip, Stephen. Taking Sides.
Guilford, Massachusetts. Dublin Publishing Group. 2001. Task Force: Doctors Should Identify HIV Patients by Name. The News Enterprise. 28 September, 1999. Sec 1: 1. Taylor, Barbara.
AIDS. New York, New York. Rosen Publishing Group. 1988. Holmes, C. et al. Review of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 -related opportunistic infections in sub-Saharan Africa.
Clinical Infectious Diseases 36: 652662 (March 2003). Sheon N and Crosby GM. Ambivalent Tales of HIV Disclosure in San Francisco. Soc Sci & Med, 2004; 58: 2105 - 2118.
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