Anthropology (HIV)

Anthropology (HIV)

Anthropology (HIV)

Introduction

The virus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, was first identified by scientists in 1983. Since then, the geographic origins of the virus have been hotly debated in the scholarly and secular communities. Recent studies by genetic scientists have indicated that HIV-1, the more virulent form of the virus that causes AIDS, can be traced to a closely related strain of virus, called simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) that infects a subspecies of chimpanzees in Central Africa. It also happens that people in this region hunt chimpanzees for bush meat, leading scientists to believe that the virus may have passed from the blood of chimpanzees into humans through superficial wounds. Indeed, many believe that the virus has been prevalent among humans in remote, inaccessible jungle areas since the 1920s. However, in today's globalized and highly interconnected world, the virus somehow managed to escape from this region into the wider world. There are two forms of this virus, HIV-1 and HIV-2. HIV-2 is restricted to the Guinea Highlands of West Africa, while HIV-1 accounts for the majority of AIDS cases throughout the world.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is the retro-virus that causes clinical spectrum of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Once infected with the virus, said a person is HIV positive. HIV infects and gradually destroys, then the key elements of the immune system, making victims vulnerable to a host of opportunistic infections and rare cancers. The development of one or more of these diseases characteristic is what defines AIDS (Green and Sobo, 2000). "HIV / AIDS" is used to designate the entire spectrum of disease progression from initial infection by the advanced stage of disease.

The Scope of Medical Anthropology

As noted, anthropologists look at health and illness from a broad perspective; for example, Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology contains 53 thematic and comparative essays as well as 52 “cultural portraits” of health and illness in specific cultures around the world. Thematic and comparative essays address topics as diverse as bioethics, medical pluralism, shamanism, homelessness, nutrition, social stratification, aging, breastfeeding, immunization, genital mutilation, alcohol use and abuse, cholera, culture-bound syndromes, stress, diabetes, diarrhea, HIV/AIDS research, malaria, mental retardation, sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), tobacco use and abuse, and tuberculosis (Piot and Coll, 2001).

The emergence of HIV / AIDS has increased in the first worldwide epidemic since the influenza epidemic of 1918 to 1919. Unlike influenza, which hit more or less uniformly, the epidemiology of HIV / AIDS has been remarkably varied and depends on a complex mix of socio-cultural. Politics, poverty, sexual behavior, science, and sex all combine to produce measurable health effects on individuals, communities and nations. The holistic view of contemporary anthropology is essential to understanding and managing the enormous impact of this global pandemic. HIV / AIDS do not involve any positive connotation, such as those assigned to tuberculosis during the nineteenth century, while in Europe the disease was considered a "Romantic fever" (Farmer, 2009). Covering the entire spectrum, from suspicion to criticism, from ostracism to discrimination, rejection, abandonment, and stigma ...