The HIV virus is a complex mix of various epidemics within several countries and regions of the world. It is unquestionably the most crucial public-health crisis of our time. Research has extended our understanding of how the virus reproduces, controls, and hides in a contaminated person. Even though our perception of pathogenesis and transmission of the virus has become more refined and prevention options have lengthened, a cure or protective vaccine remains intangible. In 1981, The New York Times published a detailed article about an outbreak of an unusual form of cancer among gay men in New York and California. It was primarily referred to as the “gay cancer”, but medically known as Kaposi Sarcoma. Around the same time, emergency rooms in New York City began to receive a large number of apparently healthy young men who presented with fevers, flu like symptoms, and a pneumonia called Pneumocystis. About a year later, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) linked the illness to blood and gave it the term Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). In that first year over 1,600 cases were diagnosed with close to 700 deaths (3).
HIV is a lentivirus, and like all viruses of this kind, it attacks the immune system. Lentiviruses are in turn part of a bigger group of viruses known as retroviruses. The name 'lentivirus' literally means 'slow virus' because they take such a long time to create any unfavorable effects in the body. They have been found in plenty of different animals, including cats, sheep, horses and cattle. However, the most appealing lentivirus in terms of the investigation into the origins of HIV is the Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV) that affects monkeys, which is believed to be at least 32,000 years old(7).
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...ments from the national level down to the community level to put into action immediate prevention programs based upon education, behavioral modification, and treatment of those infected with HIV.
No vaccine has proved successful in preventing HIV. So the epidemic continues to spread, mainly among underprivileged and marginalized populations: the poor, people of color, people in prison, injection drug users, and men who have sex with men. Many do not understand they are infected and innocently transmit the virus to others. Unawareness, prejudice, and lack of access to healthcare is fueling the outbreak. Therefore, health professionals have a critical role in screening, testing, and educating patients, families, and communities. Health professionals can also teach by example, through offering nonjudgmental, sympathetic care to those affected by this deadly virus.
There are still many issues that the government has been trying to address. One barrier that continues to exist is the stigma of HIV/AIDS. People avoid getting tested and sick individuals would wait until they were extremely ill before seeking treatment. The government has countered social stigma through a public health campaign to promote HIV testing. As more people participated in testing, public attitudes started changing (Glassman, 2016, p.28). Still, many traditionally at risk groups continue to be vulnerable. Female sex workers, young adults, and men who have sex with men, have lower rates of HIV testing and have less knowledge about HIV prevention (Glassman, 2016, p.28). Addressing these populations will require additional social
Although antiretroviral treatment has reduced the toll of AIDS related deaths, access to therapy is not universal, and the prospects of curative treatments and an effective vaccine are uncertain. Thus, AIDS will continue to pose a significant public health threat for decades to come.
With the emergence of HIV over thirty years ago, it has been estimated that more than half a million people have died from AIDS in the United States. As of 2006, approximately 2.2 million people in the United States are HIV positive with roughly 50,000 new infections per year. The most alarming statistic is that 20% of people that are HIV positive are unaware, making them susceptible to passing on the infection unknowingly. Public health programs have been working since the emergence of HIV to educate the populations, trying to give them the knowledge and the tools to protect themselves from infection. As more information has been collected about the transmission of HIV and the relevant social behaviors of susceptible populations leading to transmission, public health programs have been adjusting their messages and methods.
“In 1980, a life-threatening human immune dysfunction of unknown origins was noticed in Central Africa, Europe, and the United States” (Poindexter, 2007, p. 6). In 1981, in the United States, the disease was first reported to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). HIV stands for human immunodeficiency virus. It is the virus that can lead to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS. Unlike numerous other viruses, the human body cannot rid itself of HIV. That means that once you have HIV, you have it for life (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2013). Currently, no cure exists for HIV. Thankfully, with giant leaps in today’s medical and technological advancements in pharmaceutical research this disease is now considered to be a chronic condition. Today, with proper medical management and compliance the infected p...
...st importance to educate the public, not only sexually active persons but also persons who are not yet sexually active. According to an old saying, “prevention is better than cure”. Therefore it is better to educate the masses, from age 13 and up. These young minds are not yet matured and can therefore be molded and certain information can be taught to them about HIV. Nowadays underage children engage in sexual activity and therefore age should have no limit to HIV awareness. There is no current cure for HIV. Once someone is infected, they are infected for life. AIDS not only affects the individual but also everyone around them, something more must be done to save the thousands of lives that are lost annually. If everyone comes together and educate the masses, change will take place.
HIV/STD is a prevalent pandemic that affects thousands of people in Europe, Africa, and United States. More than 15 million sexually transmitted disease occur in the United States (CITE CDC). Doctors and various health professionals have sought after the prevention of HIV/STD, but health professionals have come to a conclusion stating that health promotion is the best way to beat the pandemic with the help of patients. “Rates of curable STDs in the United States, the highest in the developed world, are higher than in some developing countries. “(CDC) “STDs account for 87% of th...
On June 5, [1981] the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) [published] a…. report describing cases of a rare lung infection … in five young, previously healthy, gay men in Los Angeles. All the men [had] other unusual infections as well, indicating that their immune systems [were] not working; two [had] already died by the time [that this] report [was] published. This… marks the first official reporting of what [would] become known as the AIDS epidemic. (“Timeline of AIDS”)
HIV is believed to be a mutation of the virus found in chimpanzees that cause immunodeficiency in Africa. It is supposed that the virus infected, human during hunting chimpanzee for meat and came in contacts with their blood (CDC, 2016). In the United States the first case of HIV was reported in June 1981 in homosexuals (Qian, Taylor, Fawal & Vermund, 2006).
HIV and AIDS have affected millions of people throughout the world. Since 1981, there have been 25 million deaths due to AIDS involving men, women, and children. Presently there are 40 million people living with HIV and AIDS around the world and two million die each year from AIDS related illnesses. The Center for Disease Control estimates that one-third of the one million Americans living with HIV are not aware that they have it. The earliest known case of HIV was in 1959. It was discovered in a blood sample from a man in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Looking further into the genetics of this blood sample researchers suggested that it had originated from a virus going back to the late 1940’s or early 1950’s. In 1999, researchers had discovered that HIV is derived from chimpanzees native to west equatorial Africa. This epidemic is spreading throughout countries and infecting 14 thousand victims every day. Learning about HIV includes knowing how to contract the virus, understanding most of the people it affects, how to prevent the spread of it, and knowing what treatments are available.
For over thirty years HIV and AIDS have presented historic challenges to the human nature, especially to our planet’s public health, scientific and medical communities. It is estimated that just in the United States between 900.000 and 950.000 persons are living with HIV and about one forth of those infected have not yet been diagnosed and are unaware of their infection. The number of people with AIDS is increasing as effective new drug therapies keep HIV-infected persons healthy longer and dramatically reduce the death rates. However in spite of extremely beneficial advances in the field of HIV-AIDS treatment in recent years the epidemic is far from being over. The Center for Disease Control in the United States has estimated that about 40.000 people become infected every year and most of these are young persons under the age of 25. The epidemic of HIV is severely impacting the communities of color, particularly young men and women. Roughly about sixty percent of new infections continue to be among men having a sexual intercourse with another man. The National HIV Prevention Committee suggests that there has been resurgence in unsafe behaviors among some communities of gay men. With all the research and evidence available from various government and non-profit organizations dealing with HIV and AIDS prevention far too many Americans believe that the epidemic is over in the United States. Among minorities, women, and the poor the worst may yet to be come. African Americans represent 12 percent of the American population, which is about 35.000.000 people, but about 50 percent of the new HIV cases (www.statehealthfacts.org). In the United States some 80 percent of all women infected are women of color. In addition African-American women are becoming infected at younger age compared to their white peers primarily through heterosexual contact. Hispanics present about 14 percent of the US population, about 40.322.930 people, and 20 percent of HIV-AIDS cases. The HIV infection rate among Native Americans is approximately one and a half time that of whites and they die from AIDS much faster than the whites due to late diagnosis.
Over 33 million people around the world have AIDS (“Global Statistics.”). The disease, caused by the virus HIV, attacks the immune system, which is meant to protect your body from illness. Currently, there is no cure for AIDS, and 25 million have lost their lives due to it. AIDS is a serious issue affecting many people around the world today as they struggle with the disease, research for medicines, and attempt to reduce new infections
Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a disease (lentivirus) of the immune system caused by infection with human immunodeficiency virus. It is characterized by a short period of flu-like symptoms followed by a long period of little to no symptoms. As HIV progresses further eventually into AIDS, one’s chances of getting opportunistic infections and tumours that would not normally affect someone with a normally working immune system.
Since the early 1980’s, HIV has been an enigma in the United States and around the world. Although first a total mystery to all, it now seems to perplex scientists more than the general public. I argue that this is simply due to a lack of information. The average citizen does not realize the complexity of the virus, which can make public service announcements and campaigns difficult to create. This also makes it extremely challenging to persuade those most at risk for the disease to seek preventative measures, rather than waiting until they have contracted it. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that, although rate of infection is declining, over 37,000 people were newly infected in 2014, with an estimated 1,122,900 people living with the infection at the end of 2015 (1). Most people are astonished that a vaccine has not been created, yet don’t bother to educate themselves on why. Even with billions of dollars poured into the creation of a vaccine, only one has made it to Phase III, where it then failed to be an effective
Many eyebrows raised late in 1979, when the then unkown HIV virus raised its ugly head. The first two cases of the rare cancer, Karposis Sarcoma was diagnosed in two homosexual men in N>Y>C. About the same time in Los Angeles, several cases of the rare infection, Pneumocytis cariini pneumonia were being treated. Incidences of these strange diseases and infections were sky-rocketting around the country. The disease was effecting mostly young gay men in their 30's. There was no official name for the syndrome, but it was referred to by various names, GRID (gay related inmmune disease), Gay Cancer, and, "Community Acquired Syndrome". In 1982 public health officials began to use the term, Acquired Immunodeficiency Disease (AIDS) to describe the incidences of oppotunistic infections that caused AIDS. Scientists discovered the virus that caused AIDS in 1983 (HorowitzXV). According to Brennnan Durack, this was the dawning of AIDS epidemic, or the beginnning of the public's awareness of AIDS (Durack 385-386).
This is a major stepping stone in ways we can help solve the public’s health problem regarding HIV. Our school University of California, Irvine has also taken an interest in promoting safe sexual behaviors. Their health center offer five free condoms everyday to those in need. There are other programs that aims to help those who carry the disease as well. The Ryan White HIV/AIDS program is administered by the U.S Department of Human Services along with other public health service agencies. The program was created to help those who have HIV/AIDS but cannot afford for treatments. This is very useful as it can make those who carry the disease feel more secured and safe. The Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention (DHAP) also has a strategic plan and envisions a world that is free of AIDS. They want to establish an Office of Health Equity which aims to teach strategies that help cope with the disease. It was reported that DHAP have many other intervention programs that can really leave a great impact for the community in the