AIDS Could End Tomorrow  − 21 April, 2008

The one thing that amazes me in this world is why AIDS has not been stopped. I am not talking “through medical science” I am talking about the basic way it is passed… If everyone used protection (or stayed abstinent) or clean needles (or gave up IV drug use) it could end tomorrow. Literally. Yes, there are some freaky ways it can be passed that “slip through the cracks” but seriously, AIDS could literally end it’s spread tomorrow if everyone took the necessary precautions. That’s how I can’t understand why it is “spreading.” OK, yes, AIDS-infected mothers have HIV positive infants – technically it’s spreading that way, but I mean adult-to-adult – how is it spreading – and in EDUCATED COUNTRIES?!?! I can see how it spreads in the poor, uneducated areas of the world, but it is spread in the United States, where access to healthcare, KNOWLEDGE, protection and clean needles is all over the place. Why is it happening here?
Don’t we know better? Don’t we love our partners enough to protect them? Don’t we care enough about ourselves to protect ourselves? I just don’t understand it. Are people really so swept away in passion that they FORGET their life could be at stake? Or their partners’? I can imagine someone being so desperate for a fix he/she may risk it, but I sort of think those addictive personalities don’t really care about whether or not their life is at stake – the high is what is important to them – but when it comes to love, how can someone forget?
I know of a couple of people who have passed it intentionally – either as retribution, or because they did not want to be alone in their illness – they wanted their partner with them on that terrible journey – something else for them to share. Terrible, I know, but not uncommon, I would think. Is that murder? It certainly isn’t love.
There are illnesses out there that are scarier to me – I am not really in a high-risk group for contracting HIV – but I have friends who are in higher-risk groups. I can understand their not wanting to curtail their activities, but it isn’t that – protection works – it seems there are a lot of emotional issues involved in the intimacy/HIV-AIDS situation. Things like trust, honesty, risk-taking behavior, et al. But it shouldn’t be. And those who practice high-risk behaviors know it’s true – one thing should have nothing to do with the other, but it does.
I don’t know the current statistics – I haven’t bothered to look on the CDC’s website – but it seems to me, that it shouldn’t be spreading AT ALL if people used protection and clean needles. We have it in our power to stop it. Why aren’t we?