25th/75th Anniversary of AIDS

When we think of anniversaries, we usually think of a time of celebration and joy – a time to mark when people join together in a beautiful union of love. In 2006, however, we were marking a very different kind of anniversary, one the entire world wishes had never come to fruition. 2006 is the 25th anniversary of the discovery of AIDS, the virus that has plagued and continues to plague millions worldwide. Most news reports will point to June 5th as the anniversary date, as this is the date when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued an item in their Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report citing strange cases of pneumonia attacking healthy gay men. Others point to a report issued almost a month earlier on May 18th through the gay newspaper, The New York Native. The medical reporter on that report, Dr. Lawrence Mass, made the first mention of this virus that was ailing many in the gay community.

Still another controversy marking this anniversary is the fact that many feel this is truly the 75th anniversary of AIDS, as the virus originated in the 1930s in Africa. In fact, by the time the United State issued the first alarm on this virus, over one million people in Africa were already infected with AIDS and tens of thousands were succumbing to the virus each year. AIDS is still considered a fairly new disease as it is a mutation of a virus affecting chimpanzees (Simian Immunodeficiency Virus). The virus jumped its way from simians to humans in the 1930s in West Africa. While we may never know the exact reason for the jump, many speculate that a hunter may have killed, slaughtered and ate the meat of an infected monkey, causing the transition of the virus from animals to humans.

What makes the disease so much more tragic is the fact that our nation, so used to ignoring the various plights of the Africans, was so late in determining that the world had an epidemic of epic proportions on its hands. Even now, as technology and medical advances have helped create anti-retroviral drugs which help those suffering from AIDS achieve a higher standard of healthy living at low costs (as low as thirty cents a day), the majority of Africans have absolutely no access or means to these life-changing drugs.

Adding one more layer of tragedy to the situation is the fact that rich countries like the United States have the means necessary to make profound differences to the world as a whole – what these countries lack is the true desire to take aid one step further. Some estimate that for as little as 10 cents per $100 of income (approximately 35 billion dollars each year), diseases like malaria and AIDS could be rigorously curbed, if not eradicated altogether. Most feel that it is high time that American citizens stop ignoring the plight of those in Africa and other poor countries. On one hand, as with AIDS, the plights of the poor, if ignored, become the plights of the rich. Even more importantly, those who have the power and the means to help also have the responsibility to protect and serve those who do not.