Anyway, the AIDS epidemic isn't getting any better. We still haven't found a cure, 3rd world countries are not getting the medicines they need to survive through this disease, people are still out there having unprotected sex, the world is getting more connected and yet our young adults and even our older adults are still clueless of what causes the disease and how it is transmitted.
UNAIDS estimates there are 33.2million ppl with HIV, 2.5 million of them children. Around half of them have it before they are 25 years old and most of them do not live beyond 35. It is a pandemic.
In 2005 alone, 2.4 ~ 3.5 million people died of AIDS. More than half a million were children. A third of them occured in sub-Saharan Africa.
4,400 ppl die of AIDS everyday in sub-Saharan Africa. If that happens in Singapore, our population would have been wiped out within 3 years.
HIV is transmitted through blood, semen, vaginal fluid, perseminal fluid and breast milk. Yes, breast milk! Other transmissions can be in a form of anal, vaginal or oral sex. Blood transfusion like the sharing of contaminated needles can get you infected with HIV.
1st December isn't significant to me just because it is my birthday, but it is a reminder to myself and I hope to others of the implications you will get when you make the wrong decisions in your life.
There is still hope for you and there is still hope for those who have HIV. There are pills to slow down the virus and doctors are still working on a cure. Although it may seem bleak at the moment, the pills that are helping to slow down the spread of the virus infection is giving an extended life to the HIV patients.
You can read more of it here.
http://www.joinred.com/
Personally, I think everyone here has a responsibility to be informed and inform others of this disease. And at the same time, learn to protect oneself, either through protection or keeping yourself chaste.
AIDS is no longer a gay's disease, it is a people's disease, knowing no gender, race or age.
Resource, information links and how you can give your support:
http://www.avert.org/worldaid.htm
http://joinred.blogspot.com/
http://www.worldaidsday.org/index.asp
2 comments:
"AIDS is no longer a gay's disease"
As much as public perception may have made it seem so, it never was. How does a virus discriminate?
Hi zaihan. k,
I must have miswritten the sentence, it was to be written "AIDS is no longer perceived as a gay's disease". I apologise for that.
True to your comment that virus doesn't discriminate. Regarding the sentence, I was referring to the perception of ppl in the past regarding the AIDS virus. But now ppl are more well informed (although I do think more needs to be done) and realise that anyone regardless of sexual orientation could still catch the virus.
Hope that clears that up.
Thanks for you comment. :)
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