[url]http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=571&u=/nm/20020716/hl_nm/aids_college_dc_1&printer=1[/url]

[b]College Students Misjudge Scope of HIV Epidemic[/b]
[i]Tue Jul 16, 5:39 PM ET[/i]

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Many US college students may underestimate the proportion of people with HIV who live in Africa, while overestimating the number living with the virus in the US, new survey findings suggest.

[red]They also feel that the US has a greater duty to provide drugs for treating HIV/AIDS to people in North America than to those with the disease in Africa, the researchers note.[/red]

If such [red]misconceptions[/red] reflect the general population's sentiments, it may be difficult for AIDS organizations to raise money and garner the political support needed to help people with HIV/AIDS in Africa, lead investigator Timothy Dowd of the University of Miami in Florida told Reuters Health in an interview.

Dowd and his team presented the results of their survey of 195 college undergraduates last month at the American Psychological Society's annual meeting in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Roughly 70% of the 40 million or so people infected with HIV worldwide live in Africa, while 2.4% live in the US, Dowd explained.

Given the fact that the burden of HIV/AIDS falls on the poorest nations, [red]advocates[/red] for people with the disease and many public health experts [red]argue that the US[/red] and other industrialized nations [red]have a responsibility to help the developing world deal with the epidemic.[/red] HIV/AIDS, they say, is a global problem.

The US has pledged $500 million so far to the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, TB, and Malaria, which was launched last year and is being funded primarily with government contributions. Fund officials say they need an income of $7 billion to $10 billion each year for the effort to be effective.

To investigate perceptions of US college students on HIV/AIDS in Africa and North America, Dowd's team surveyed students about their knowledge of the epidemic and their sympathies toward infected individuals.

On average, the students thought 38% of HIV infected individuals lived in Africa, while they estimated that nearly 14% lived in the US.

[red]"In addition, results showed that participants felt the United States is more responsible for providing HIV/AIDS medications to HIV-infected individuals in North American as opposed to HIV-infected individuals in Africa," Dowd and his colleagues write.[red]

[i][red]The horror, the horror![/red][/i]

Dowd said the survey also revealed that students were sympathetic to women who had contracted HIV from their husbands and to infants who contracted the infection from their mothers, [red]but were much less sympathetic to female prostitutes and their male clientele who became infected through unprotected sex.[/red]

[i][red]Shameless![/red][/i]

[red]Such negative attitudes toward some people with HIV may pose a barrier to raising money and helping people, explained Dowd.[/red]

I see nothing negative about the students' attitudes at all.

You wanna work at eliminating AIDS?  Eliminate the carriers.  Maybe if they didn't fuck like rabbits over there there wouldn't be so much of a problem.  Man, I really hate shitty third world countries trying to suck up U.S. taxpayer money.  Nuke the bastards and get it over with.

No no no! It's the bleading heart liberals (BHL's) [b]over here[/b] who wants us to send help to Africa. People with AIDS in Africa don't give a shit where they get help from.

As I recall the leading factors in population control are, and have always been (in no specific order):
1. Famine
2. Natural disasters
3. Diseases
4. War

So on one side these morons want to complain about feeding the starving masses, whilst at the same time the problem is being taken care of by nature, and then they want to stop it?! Pick one for f*ck's sake!

Unfortunately HIV/AIDS is hitting some areas harder than others - China could do with a little weeding too. I believe that country is on top of the list of countries predicted to have massive starvation problems in the near future. Mass death might provoke the Chinese people to finally revolt against the communist regime. And I can't really say I think that sound like a bad thing. [:D]

Of course, on an individual basis, each HIV/AIDS case is a tragedy, but from a big picture perspective it's a form of natural selection that we can easily protect ourselves against (know your partner, wear a rubber, & don't do drugs.)

The problem in Western Society is that we're increasingly obsessed with youth and trying to extend life (and to force these values onto others), whereas African and Asian cultures care more about being able to die with dignity instead of trying to postpone the inevitable.

If the BHL's could get it through their heads that what seems right to them (i.e. postponing the inevitable) isn't right for the rest of the world, they might actually realize that people in Africa isn't that worried about dying and that they're best off if left alone. Dying is part of life, and it's something other cultures are far better prepared for than we are in Western Society.

So in the end it comes down to this - let's take care of ourselves first.

Malthusian