AIDS The Fatal Disease

Outline

The oulline of the paper is as follows;

Thesis Statement

Introduction

Discussion

References

Bibliography

Thesis Statement

AIDS is a serious fatal disease of the immune system that is transmitted through sexual contact, blood products, or contaminated needles. Fatal means: causing ruin or death, deadly, disasterous, fateful. Affecting one's destiny.

Introduction

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) is human viral disease that ravages the immune system, undermining the body's ability to defend itself from infection and disease. Caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), AIDS leaves an infected person vulnerable to opportunistic infections (Frank 20).

In fact, the teenagers are most typically affected by AIDS and also people who have sexual contact with someone who has HIV. As of the end of 2003, an estimated 40 million people worldwide - 37 million adults and 2.5 million children younger than 15 years - were living with HIV/AIDS. Nowhere is this better demonstrated than in sub-Saharan Africa, where the number of AIDS cases far exceeds that of all other geographic regions. Of the estimated 14,000 HIV infections that occur each day worldwide, about half of these infections occur in sub-Saharan Africa (Fox 201). About 70 percent of all people infected with HIV live in this region. In some countries in the southern part of the continent, including Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe, more than 30 percent of the population has HIV infection or AIDS. (Breo 2-7)

Discussion

The AIDS pandemic is a greater threat to global human security than are organized terrorist groups. Yet the Bush administration refuses to acknowledge this fact.

This past weekend, as the international community once again commemorated World AIDS Day by noting new estimates of 3 million more dead, 5 million new HIV infections and 40 million people now living with HIV/AIDS, even these shocking new statistics failed to stir action from those whose intervention could turn the tide of the pandemic. And most media outlets gave the occasion only perfunctory attention. (Burris 01-09)

Those on the front lines -- people living with AIDS, medical professionals and community activists, family and friends -- are fighting the war on AIDS with the resources they have. But they are not nearly enough. Indeed, they are a pittance compared to the billions quickly mobilized for the war on terrorism. The rich countries that could easily fund a serious defense against the global threat of AIDS have refused to make more than token contributions to the United Nations' Global Health Fund created to fight the war against it. As the pandemic continues to devastate Africa, and threatens to explode in other regions, including Russia and south Asia, policymakers in Washington are hardly noticing. (Chambers 1-7)

Nowhere has the AIDS crisis had a more terrible impact than in Africa. The continent has already lost more than 17 million people to AIDS and is currently home to 28 million of the 40 million people worldwide living with the disease. While the crisis is most severe in Africa, HIV infection rates are rising around the world. The pandemic highlights the shared vulnerability of all countries to global threats to human ...