Aids is a worldwide pandemic, it is affecting people on every continent, and country. However this paper focuses on Africa, within the county of Uganda. In Uganda, AIDS rate has dropped drastically in the last ten years. Whether it is due to deaths, incorrect calculations, change in behavior or a country coming together as one, this country has worked for several years to reduce the rate of people infected with the disease. Although, Uganda has made commendable progress in improving the fight towards AIDS they still lack and are in much more of improvement. The country as one needs education, they need to be taught and raise awareness even more.
According to the Millennium Development Goals, Uganda has made improvements to reduce the spread of AIDS. Uganda was one of the first countries in Africa to report a decline in the rate In 1986, President Yoweri Museveni made a commitment to help fight AIDS and organized a program to help establish the National AIDS Control Program with the Ministry of Health (Global Initiative, Buonocore, 2003). President Museveni made it clear that AIDS was not a problem but it was something the country was dealing as one. Museveni helped with creating ideas and programs to help his people deal with the disease. In 1992, the Uganda AIDS commission opened and their mission “is to provide overall leadership in the coordination and management of an effective HIV/AIDS National Response” (Uganda AIDS Commission, 1992). Now the commission is the headquarters used for AIDS information. With the commission opened the people of Uganda had hope and support to help them with the disease, and the commission has helped reduced the rate and educate the people of Uganda. With all the help the people of Uganda has received from organizations, they still need to improve their numbers, as the rates drop they also come back up. There is no accurate percentage of the dropped rate, all is known that organizations need to raise more awareness, and begin with the young ones.
Unfortunately, the people of Uganda suffer from other issues surrounded by AIDS that enabled them to find a solution. Poverty, hunger, gender inequalities and no jobs are just some other issues surrounding AIDS. Many of the people of Uganda suffer from hunger; you cannot give a person medicine if they do not have food to eat. Most importantly you can advise the women to wear a condom, but the men will not listen due to their religious and faith-based beliefs.
"Jones originally envisioned the AIDS quilt as a message that would call upon the conscience of the nation." (Sturken 186)
What would you say if I asked you to tell me what you think is causing the death of so many people in the horn of Africa? AIDS? Starvation? War? Would it surprise you if I told you that it all boils down to the women of Africa? Kofi Annan attempts to do just this in his essay “In Africa, Aids Has a Woman's Face.” Annan uses his work to tell us that women make up the “economic foundation of rural Africa” and the greatest way for Africa to thrive is through the women of Africa's freedom, power, and knowledge.
AIDS is slowly becoming the number one killer across the globe. Throughout numerous small countries, AIDS has destroyed lives, taken away mothers, and has left hopeless children as orphans. The problem remains that funding for the diseases’ medical research is limited to none. In the country Brazil, HIV/AIDS has been compared to the bubonic plague, one of the oldest yet, most deadly diseases to spread rapidly across Europe (Fiedler 524). Due to this issue, Brazil’s government has promised that everyone who has been diagnosed with either HIV or AIDS will receive free treatment; however, this treatment does not include help in purchasing HIV medications, that “carry astronomical price tags” (Fiedler 525). Generic drug companies have been able to produce effective HIV medications that are not as costly if compared to the prices given by the huge pharmaceutical companies. In contrast, the U.S. government has now intervened with these generic companies hindering them from making HIV medications, which may not be as efficient if made by the pharmaceutical companies. Not only are these drug companies losing thousands of dollars against generic drug companies, but also tremendous profit that is demanded for marketing these expensive drugs as well. “How many people must die without treatment until the companies are willing to lower their prices, or to surrender their patients so generic makers can enter market? (Fiedler 525).” With this question in mind, what ways can we eliminate the HIV/AIDS epidemic across the world? With research, education, testing, and funding we can prevent the spread of HIV to others and hopefully find a cure.
Uganda, formally known as the Republic of Uganda, is a poverty stricken country plagued with economic instabilities. Since the 1980’s, the economy has remained on a fairly steady climb, but many have doubts about the continuation of growth. Uganda will never achieve a stable economy if they do not establish changes to their infrastructure. To implement these modifications and maintain economic progression, Uganda will need 1) better government determination to end corruption, 2) commitment to improve the weak educational reforms, and 3) a decrease in their export vulnerabilities. Fortunately, the country is experiencing a much needed evolution in telecommunication which could be the single most contributing factor for an improved economy.
There is a lot of poverty in sub-Saharan Africa, causing these women to put providing for their families over their own health, which is understandable. Although they might have access to condoms and know they are at risk of HIV/AIDS, what they might not understand is how far these infections can spread. Evidence-based information provided in a fun and engaging session may make these women realize just how many people they are putting at risk, including their own family members. Learning condom negotiation skills may help them better protect themselves and their sexual partners. These sessions may allow these women to feel more comfortable discussing sexual health, and encourage them to get tested. Being surrounded by their peers in a non-judgemental setting may encourage them to make changes, or support each other’s decisions to make
Yesterday, Angola's Ministry of Health announced that there have been 266 documented human infections of the Marburg epidemic since the current outbreak began in October of last year. 244 of these cases have been fatal, providing a horrific mortality rate which can be attributed both to the largely unknown and uncontrollable nature of this disease, and the impoverished state of the nation it is afflicting.
The AIDS epidemic has reached disastrous proportions on the continent of Africa. Over the past two decades, two thirds of the more than 16 million people in the world infected with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), which causes AIDS, live in sub-Saharan Africa. It is now home to the largest number of people infected, with 70 percent of the world’s HIV infected population. The problem of this ongoing human tragedy is that Africa is also the least equipped region in the world to cope with all the challenges posed by the HIV virus. In order understand the social and economic consequences of the disease, it is important to study the relationship between poverty, the global response, and the effectiveness of AIDS prevention, both government and grass roots.
By the year 2000, 58 million people have been infected by HIV/AIDS and alarming numbers such as 22 million would have already died. And the epidemic continues to spread. HIV/AIDS historically is considered to be one of the longest running worldwide epidemics that we have ever seen, and figures cannot be placed on the true death tolls or estimation of the damage as the cycle still is yet to reach an end (Whiteside 2002). With Africa being the worst hit continent in the world in terms of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the severity of it’s prevalence; one can only begin to question whether HIV/AIDS and poverty and directly connected or the inter-linkages exacerbate one or the other. This paper aims to argue that HIV/AIDS is a manifestation of poverty, and simultaneously poverty contributes to growing HIV/AIDS epidemic. Development in response both to poverty reduction and to HIV/AIDS is complicated when both have multi-dimensional and multi-faceted impacts on a society, whether it be social, economic or human development impacts. This paper will argue that pre-existing socio economic conditions within a country such as high levels of poverty, poor sanitation, malnutrition, environmental degradation and poor public healthcare systems and limited access to preventative care are crucial factors in contributing to the transfer of the infection (Pasteur: 2000, Mann: 1999).
The Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, commonly known as HIV/AIDS is a disease, with which the human immune system, unlike in other disease, cannot cope. AIDS, which is caused by the HIV virus, causes severe disorder of the immune system and slowly progresses through stages which disable the body’s capability to protect and instead makes it vulnerable for other infections. The first blood sample to contain HIV was drawn in 1959 in Zaire, Africa while molecular genetics have suggested that the epidemic first began in the 1930s (Smallman & Brown, 2011). Currently, according to the Joint UN Program on HIV/AIDS, 35.3 million people worldwide are living with HIV. In 2012, an estimated 2.3 million people became newly infected with the virus and 1.6 million people lost their lives to AIDS (Fact Sheet, UNAIDS). It is due to the globalized international society that a disease which existed in one part of the world has managed to infect so many around the world. Globalization is narrowly defined by Joseph Stiglitz as "the removal of barriers to free trade and the closer integration of national economies" (Stiglitz, 2003). Globalization has its effects in different aspects such as economy, politics, culture, across different parts of the world. Like other aspects, globalization affects the health sector as well. In a society, one finds different things that connect us globally. As Barnett and Whiteside point out (2000), “health and wellbeing are international concerns and global goods, and inherent in the epidemic are lessons to be learned regarding collective responsibility for universal human health” (Barnett & Whiteside, 2000). Therefore, through all these global connections in the international society, t...
The AIDS virus is the most common disease, and with no cure, an infected person will die. It is estimated that 90 to 95 percent of AIDS infections occur in developing countries where the world’s worst living conditions exist.
To decrease HIV transmission and to minimise the impact of the epidemic, on children, young people and families, through the growing effectiveness of national action to the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the East of Asia and the Pacific regions. They aim to provide practical support and aid at community level, encouraging the full engament of people affected by HIV/AIDS.
The emergence of HIV/AIDS is viewed globally as one of the most serious health and developmental challenges our society faces today. Being a lentivirus, HIV slowly replicates over time, attacking and wearing down the human immune system subsequently leading to AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) at which point the affected individual is exposed to life threatening illnesses and eventual death. Despite the fact that a few instances of this disease have been accounted for in all parts of the world, a high rate of the aforementioned living with HIV are situated in either low or medium wage procuring nations. The Sub-Saharan region Africa is recognized as the geographic region most afflicted by the pandemic. In previous years, people living with HIV or at risk of getting infected did not have enough access to prevention, care and treatment neither were they properly sensitized about the disease. These days, awareness and accessibility to all the mentioned (preventive methods, care etc.) has risen dramatically due to several global responses to the epidemic. An estimated half of newly infected people are among those under age 25(The Global HIV/AIDS Epidemic). It hits hard as it has no visible symptoms and can go a long time without being diagnosed until one is tested or before it is too late to manage.
... diseases such as AIDS are also becoming a problem in places like Africa. Knowledge of how to prevent these diseases is not widely known, so an increasing number of people are infected. More attention needs to be placed on adequate health care and technology in these countries. While these third world societies may not have the resources with which to implement these changes, more advanced societies certainly do.
HIV and AIDS have had the most significant and destructive impact upon Swaziland. Nearly two-fifths of the country’s adults are estimated to be affected by HIV/AIDS, which is one of the highest infection rates in the world. This epidemic has resulted in Swaziland having higher infant mortality, higher death rates, and a life expectancy of twenty-seven. One reason the spread of HIV/AIDS is so difficult to contain is the polygamous nature of Swazi culture. Men are encouraged by their society to marry as many women as possible, which makes it easy for sexually transmitted diseases to spread.
UNAIDS/WHO. (July 2008). Understanding HIV/AIDS: Educating and raising HIV awareness about this epidemic. Retrieved from http://shenandoahconnection.com/hiv.htm