Sub Saharan Africa Essay

Jailene Derisse
Mrs.Bryant
24 May 2013 Over the course of many years, parts of Sub Saharan Africa have decreased in their population because of the STD AIDS. The African government plays a significant role in the reason behind the way AIDS has spread throughout Africa, as an epidemic. When AIDS was beginning to be well known, many African leaders did intervene and showed moral support for some time. Unfortunately, they fell short of providing adequate resources to the African people such as the drugs, better equipped hospitals and a safer country. Many other first class developed countries heard of the epidemic AIDS and the lack of help from their governments. Many of those countries did not feel the need to educate
Africa about the disease that has slowly been killing half of the population. AIDS was unknown to everybody around the world. It was a new disease, and the scientists who studied it, gave a hypothesis stating only homosexuals could receive the virus. When the virus began to spread to Africa, people believed in that myth, causing a sharp decline of the human population. Africa is the only country that has a horrible history of AIDS. Other western countries are keeping the disease under control because the government takes care of their society and people are educated. The loss of thousands of Africans caused many economic issues for Africa. Money wasn’t provided before the rapid spread of AIDS and it still isn’t being provided for them today. If Africa had money, the government could build better hospitals for safer health conditions. The government could not build schools for the kids who don’t already have the disease and educated them in the prevention of the HIV/AIDS virus. Western countries are stable enough because of their economy and the education that is provided by their governments. The millions of Africans diagnosed with AIDS cause more than of the population to decline over the past ten years, due to the lack of involvement from the African leaders and the lack of involvement from the developed western countries. In 1980, California had some reports on several men dying from an unknown source. The unexpected deaths across California caused people to question what was causing the deaths among men. Scientists studied it further and came up with a diagnosis. After the diagnosis was giving out more men died questioning if this was cancer for the homosexual. Once that was discussed, women started dying too, not just in California but other states throughout the United States . A total of twenty states had men and women dying unexpectedly. In July a meeting was coming together in D.C to talk more about the unexpected virus AIDS. That meeting was when AIDS got its official name. In time more scientists carefully examined the virus and concluded it was a sexually transmitted disease that caused the HIV virus. HIV can be spread through non sanitized piercing/needles, transmission of blood, semen and mothers who breast feed.
In 1985, President Ronald Reagan decided it was appropriate to publicly announce the new virus AIDS that could not be cured once caught. The public automatically reacted with an antiretroviral drug. The drug does not cure AIDS but it reduces the risk of dying. The cost of the antiretroviral drug in the United States is averaged around ten thousand dollars per patient. In Africa half of the people who are infected are living in poor communities and the other half don’t know there are drugs because their leaders don’t provide them with a proper education on the
disease. In 1987, seven years after the first appearance of AIDS in California, Africa had its first black African man to be diagnosed with AIDS. Africa wasn’t well educated like the western countries, so when the man was diagnosed, nobody paid much attention. In 1990’s AIDS spread throughout the whole continent of Africa in the span of three years. In 1991, the disease was equally distributed among the heterosexuals and homosexuals. Africans still were not educated to know why everyone was dying. Many believed it was a disease only homosexual males could get causing the women to become confident they wouldn’t be the ones to receive the virus. In 1992, the AIDS prevalence rose 0.7% to 2.2% in the span of two years. The west did receive knowledge about these percentages and many of those countries in the west were going through the same problem as Africa. Unlike the west, Africa doesn’t have five floor hospitals or doctors that won Nobel Prizes. In Africa no one knew about AIDS. Typically, they would be made aware they have the disease when they go to the hospital for a checkup or because they are in their death bed at home. The hospitals in the southern part of Africa aren’t sanitized.
Americans who travel to Africa and get sent to the hospitals see rats and three people sharing the same bed. The air feels thick and contaminated with different diseases. As Africa heard more news about AIDS, the hospitals went over the capacity. This caused people waiting hours or weeks to receive help. Since Africa is one of the poorest countries around the world, hospitals aren’t the most important buildings to construct. There is at most one hospital in the range of one thousand miles to the next town in Africa. The nurses who work in the hospitals are at high risk at receiving AIDS because HIV can be transmitted through blood. The health care department is decreasing in employment because the majority of nurses and doctors in Africa are getting
infected. 28 is a book by Stephanie Nolen, she writes about AIDS and the impact it has done to different people in Africa. Out of the 28 people she spent time with and interviewed was a doctor and so was her husband. Lydia was a well educated doctor in Africa. Her husband died from AIDS and a couple of weeks after, he passed away Lydia too, was diagnosed with the virus. She became very close to death until her family paid for the antiretroviral drug. Lydia was very lucky her family helped her because most of the Africans that get diagnosed get turned away from their families. Other doctors go through the same experience Lydia went through which is why the health care department has a lot of job openings. The majority of people diagnosed with AIDS have to quit their job. In most homes, both parents get the virus creating an issue for the care of their children. In the past twenty years since AIDS came about, it is estimated more children will either become orphans or will drop out of school and provide for their family. Children as young as eight take care of their parents and themselves. They take care of money and they clean their houses for a sterilized environment and they go out and buy food to cook. Teenagers are becoming prostitutes to have money to pay for rent and to hopefully have money to buy the antiretroviral drug. Kids ranging from eight to sixteen don’t have the chance for an education. Other kids get sent to an orphanage because both parents died and their grandparents died as well. There are 1.9 million orphans in Africa today; all of those 1.9 million children are orphans because their family members died of AIDS. The women in Africa are at high risk when it comes to catching AIDS. Women are at high risk because of their husbands. AIDS in Africa caused so many families to split apart. Families treat each other like they don’t know them. Women get furious because it was mostly the men in the relationship that had sexual intercourse with somebody other than his wife. The men eventually die because they had the disease for so long there isn’t anything more they could do. The children become the adults in the family and the grandparents don’t socialize with their children. Rape is another way women get pregnant or receive HIV. Men would individually look for a female under the age of 26. Research shows rape is one of the main reasons AIDS is spread through Africa. Half of girls or women who become pregnant or have an abortion are victims to the group of men who go into town and rape multiple women without any protection. 50% of the children in the next generation will have HIV. Education is another problem children undergo as AIDS continuously spread throughout Africa. Africa doesn’t provide public schools like many countries the west, but they do provide some education. Majority of kids have dropped out because they needed to take care of their parents who got infected. Studies show that kids with a lack of an education have double the chance of catching the HIV virus. Their chances are double because they aren’t aware of the symptoms HIV have. With a decent education everybody in Africa will know what to look for and would know the ways you catch AIDS. AIDS wouldn’t have killed millions of people if the majority of them knew what it was. The Joint United Nations Programme on Aids (UNAIDS) were created to help third worlds countries. UNAIDS is a successful organization that has been around for ten years. In the early 2000’s Africa was known as the worst country to undergo AIDS. Millions were dying and AIDS was quickly labeled as an epidemic. UNAIDS worked with the people in Africa, educating them about the consequences about unsafe sex and multiple sexual partners without proper protection. Now in the year 2013 6.2 million Africans are now on the antiretroviral drug and AIDS related deaths are reducing. As noted before, AIDS/HIV has a huge impact on children and families. In most cases the infected children become orphans and are cared by institutions. These institutions give care and support for the children. As treatment keeps improving more children are surviving childhood and making it to adult hood. Since 2009 South Africa has had one of the sharpest declines in new infections among children. In 2011, more than 95 percent of pregnant women with HIV received treatment to prevent the infection of their child. Infections in children have dropped dramatically from 56,500 in 2009 to 29,100 in 2011. In South Africa child and maternal mortality increased but thankfully it has declined since 2003. In South Africa guidelines are enforced for HIV-positive pregnant women. All pregnant women who were pregnant who tested HIV positive will begin treatment at 14 weeks instead of the last term of pregnancy. This will hopefully reduce the chances of receiving a baby who is HIV positive. To be aware of HIV and AIDS, there are number of campaigns that will help you. In the past two years a campaign called HCT influenced a lot of people. The campaign thought it would be wise to discuss HIV throughout the country by using the media. Such as publicizing, free testing and counseling in health clinics. There were a total of four campaigns and one of four reached to Africa. The ages 15-24 got the message which was the exact age group that needed to be targeted. The lack of awareness is still extremely poor but the campaigns are slowly increasing the warnings of HIV and AIDS. The Protect the Goal organization is another group that help AIDS/HIV children to understand the HIV virus. More than half of children don’t recognize the damage AIDS can project, but worst they don’t know their affected. Protect the Goal is determined to get the antiretroviral drug to all 15 million children by the year 2015. Adults are like children, they don’t know they are affected until it’s too late. About 34 million people live with HIV and around half don’t know their status. UNAIDS hopes the amount for the second and first line of the antiretroviral drug to be reduced. This may increase our chances to decrease the 34 million to a more reasonable number. Successfully in last ten years putting aside all the changes, the UNAIDS, The Protect the Goal, and other organizations succeeded in decreasing the HIV epidemic. Countries are making history and eliminating the AIDS epidemic. Roughly 700,000 fewer people aren’t affected with HIV infections since the year 2001- 2011. Ericka Eckholm clearly states Africa condition isn’t getting better with the AIDS epidemic. Men and Women in several different villages are disappearing in large numbers. Men and Women are not encouraged to be married in Africa because of the vast numbers of people who are infected with the AIDS virus. It is dangerous to your well being not knowing that your future spouse is infected. 2.5 million People were diagnosed with AIDS in 1987, now it is said that number is to be doubled maybe tripled. Approximately 40 percent of pregnant women are putting their unborn child at risk of being HIV positive. The outcome of that child to making it to the age of 1 year old is very unlikely. The children that do make it grow up to see their mothers and siblings die, and will most likely become orphans. More than half of the children in Africa are sent to an orphanage. In Central and Eastern Africa where there are six million children. Sadly, 6 to 11 percent under the age of fifteen will lose one of both of their parents. HIV and AIDS cause a reduced labor, amongst those who are able to work, many would need to quit due to the rapid spread of the virus. The government would need to reduce the amount of income because of all the unemployment.

In many countries of sub-Saharan Africa, AIDS has an impact on life expectancy. The average life expectancy has decreased by twenty years. The life expectancy has fallen twenty years due to the number of babies born HIV positive and the number of children dying at a young age. Adults between the ages 20 and 49 have the biggest death increase in sub-Saharan Africa. Before AIDS was an epidemic, Africa had trouble with debt and they had trouble with trade. HIV and AIDS together has caused Africa’s economy to become smaller. Treatment is slowly being distributed throughout Africa and millions of lives are being saved. Unfortunately more than half of the people who need the treatment still are unable to receive it. The impact of HIV and AIDS in Africa combined with other issues such as poverty and poor public services has cause the victims of AIDS to receive terrible medical and inadequate treatment.

Aids is a devastating disease. It kills millions of people each year, half of those being children. Now people in Africa are more cautious with their sexual partners. Organizations such as UNAIDS and the Grand Fund educated people to practice safe sex. Unprotected sex is the number one reason why AIDS is transmitted through Africa as an epidemic. Since 1999 men never used condoms because they believed it wasn’t worth it. In the year 2009 more than half of men started using condoms which reduce their risks of catching AIDS. People in Africa are having a well rounded education about the disease that’s kills millions. Every day 800 people die every day still but the epidemic is getting managed. Millions of people are still getting affected but the numbers of people dying are reducing every year. Women who become pregnant immediately go to the hospital to get tested, males get circumcised and women who breast feed make sure their negative. Since the late eighties when Africa was beginning to realize AIDS, to the nineties when the AIDS epidemic spread out of control. Africa evolved into a country that was the poorest and the most uneducated to a country that now still have AIDS but can manage it. Thanks to the organizations that worked with Africa for twenty years, African people have more knowledge and can protect themselves. The leaders of Africa didn’t help educate their people or help make the country a better, safe place to live. They didn’t educate their people on the risks of AIDS. The western countries knew a lot of knowledge about AIDS. UNAIDS was a group that formed in the western hemisphere but only that organization helped make a huge difference from 1987 to now.
. AIDS has been around for twenty years. Africa has had the worst experience with HIV and AIDS. Millions of children, women, and men have died. Organizations helped a lot with educating the people infected and the people who are at risk. Many people now are aware of what to look out for and what to do when having intercourse. In the year 2013, more Africans are surviving AIDS and many are receiving the antiretroviral drug. There are still people dying every day and many getting diagnosed but since 1987, there is hope to eliminate AIDS in the next ten to twenty years. The leaders of Africa did some support groups and public announcements about AIDS. Credit to the western countries and several of their organizations that helped Africa get to where they are as a country today. The African government could’ve built better hospitals and create educational groups that would provide factual information about AIDS and what to do to prevent catching it. The west could have taken more action towards Africa. The west had a lot of money and has a stable economy to help stabilize Africa. Both of these governments could have made more of a difference involving AIDS. Rape wouldn’t be a main reason why teenage girls and middle aged women catch AIDS or have abortions. Hospitals could have had more beds and some of the patients that were waiting for so long to be treated probably would have been treated. The African society has suffered a major impact due to the AIDS epidemic. Better involvement from the west and from the African government would have made a difference in the amount of people that have been diagnosed with AIDS and could have saved millions of lives. The African government could have taken a more active and responsible role in educating the African people on how to prevent such a devastating disease. And educating those infected with options and available treatment. Hopefully in the next ten to twenty years Africans will be able to prevail and win the war against AIDS.

Work Cited Nolen,Stephanie. 28. Canada: Human Rights Reporting, 2008.124-136.Print. “New UNAIDS report highlights progress in the AIDS response in Africa.” UNAIDS.Np.,Nd. Web 21 May 2013. http://www.unaids.org/en/resources/presscentre/pressreleaseandstatementarchive/2013/may/20130521prupdateafrica/ “Good News ON Aids in Africa.” The Slate Group. Web. 21 May 2013
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2013/03/good_news_on_aids_in_africa_religious_leaders_help_fight_disease.html