Will Payne
Advance Composistion
Mrs. Meeuwemburg
12/11/07
AIDS
There are an estimated total of 42 million people in the world living with HIV/AIDS and another estimated 22 million deaths due to the virus. The population of California is about 36 million and the population of Texas is about 24 million(12). Imagine wiping out the entire state of California and Texas with just one epidemic. This would mean that the United States would only have 48 states. This epidemic is catastrophic and there can be much ore done to address the issue. If more money, time and effort were poured into the education and prevention of AIDS there would be a drastic improvement in the amount of future deaths. If the question “is AIDS a problem was asked,” I don’t think anyone could say no. It is obvious that AIDS is a problem it is just a matter of what people can do to keep the virus from spreading.
AIDS is a fairly new virus that has taken hold of this planet by storm. It was discovered in the state of California when to gay men were dying from pneumonia. The doctors found this pretty odd because pneumonia is a fairly treatable disease (8). They looked more in depth and discovered the HIV virus. The HIV virus, or human immunodeficiency virus, is dubbed a sexually transmitted disease, which means it is most common to contract the virus through sexual contact or unprotected sex (not using a conodm). It can also be contracted through blood transfusions such as sharing needles(4). HIV gets into ones body and starts attacking the immune system. Once contracted violent infections begin to break the body down such as a cold or influenza because the immune system is so broken down. After HIV is fully cultured it turns into AIDS which is a more serious state of the virus. This is when most people die, usually from infections like the flu or pneumonia(HIV and AIDS).
After the virus was discovered, in the late 80’s the virus began to gain more publicity throughout the United states and the world for that matter. It began to become known as the gay mans disease throughout the United States because the majority of cases were in gay men but then the famous movies star Rock Hudson died from the virus. People started to realize that this wasn’t just a gay mans disease and that it was a real issue (8).
AIDS is the culprit to many staggering facts that can make ones heart ache. Once one contracts AIDS it is like a death sentence because there is no cure for it. It varies on how long one has to live but it is inevitable that one will survive AIDS. Although there are many drugs and therapies that can prolong the expected time to live they cannot erase the virus completely. But a cure is on the way. “spectacular advances have been made in HIV/AIDS therapies”(Anthony Faucci). There are about 20 different types of drugs and “drug cocktails,” mixture of drugs that can help with the virus but no matter what advances have been made there is still no cure. Another heart-aching fact is right now there is 14 million AIDS orphans and by the year 2010 there will be an estimated 25 million orphans. Most of these orphans are in Africa where the epidemic is the biggest.
Though AIDS is and epidemic all around the world the most infected area by far is Africa. “AIDS is the leading cause of death in Africa, 10 of 11 people infected with HIV/AIDS live in sub-Saharan Africa (www.worlded.org). It is a fact that AIDS is more common in impoverished countries and the most infected countries in Africa are Swaziland, Botswana, Lesotho and South Africa. The average GDP per capita for those countries is $6039 per year, compared to the $44,000 of the United States. These countries are in serious poverty and the AIDS victims in these countries are directly related to GDP per capita.
