stopping the plague

yesterday, the 1st of december was world aids day , the 20th anniversary and to mark the day the w channel aired the special "rampant". which was a special about sydney and australia fought the spread of aids when it was first diagnoised and discovered in the early 80's to be a real disease

i was really interested as aids was one of the few new items and world events i can remember from my childhood. i can vividly remember the aids awareness campaign aid with the grim reaper. i also had a family friend who had aids when i was young and can remember being scared when i first found out about it and 9 years old and had a room mate with HIV when i was in my late teens 

the opening sent chills down my spine!

"25 years ago a man came in to St Vincents hospital sydney sick. he was from new york, a gardner young and fit with a crowded sexual history and he was gay. the doctors made their diagnosis the first in australia. this man had aids. no one knew what caused it or how it might be spread, later when he seamed well he was simply discharged and that was the last the doctors saw of him."

pretty soon more and more gay man were being infected with hiv/aids. no one knew thought it was a virus. they didnt know its history, what caused it, how it was spread, and how to treat it. before it was recgonised to be tarnsmitted by blood. doctors assumed that it was and that there was identified high risk groups, gay man, iv drug uses, sex workers. leapers of the community.

it took some time but the government funded aids eductation programs. needle exchanges were set up across the country so that if you used drugs you could ensure you had a clean needle, condoms were given to brothels with legislation put into place. and target education to gay men on the importance of using condoms. there was also a national program to encourage the general public to use condoms as well at very sexual encounter. a national add was put on australian tvs to shock everyone to tell everyone you were at risk of getting aids if you were not using safe sex practices. 

these were the grim reaper adds that of 1987/88 that everyone of that eara can remember. i was simple terrified of them when they came on. and they still look scary today.

these programs are the "australian model" and is funded permanently. there has never been 1 case of suspected case of a sexual worker been transmitted to a client. 25 000 people have been prevented  from contacting aids/hiv from needle exchange 

by 1987 the spread of aids was down. 6 1/2 thousand people have died in australia from aids. against the trends around the world aids/hiv rates continue to decline 

the australia model is not how hiv is fought in most of the world. elsewhere strategies to stop the virus are based on beliefs about how the world should behave.

the bigger funder of international hiv programs is the usa. most of its funds go to promoting abstinence until marriage and zero tolerance for drugs. it opposes needle exchange and limits support for condoms

around the world 25 million people have died from hiv/aids. 40 million are now infected unless policies change within 10 years 80 million will carry this deadly preventable virus