The Impact of Homophobia and the HIV/AIDS Epidemic - Essay Example

 1 The Impact of Homophobia and the HIV/AIDS Epidemic Introduction Viruses have been with us since time immemorial. There is no one yet who can lay claim to having been free from the irritation of the viral common cold. This is something the world has accepted despite that up to now there is no known cure for the common cold virus. But virulent strains of new viral diseases one by one appeared which threatened to annihilate humankind and bring it to extinction. In 1918, the swine flu made its entrance to the world, disappeared, mutated and landed in Russia with a new name H1N1 in 1933 (Schachter 162). It reappeared in 1950 and in 1970 and lately made its devastating presence in Mexico in 2009. The Ebola virus was even more menacing as it threatened to wipe out the denizens of both Zaire and Sudan in 1976 where 400 failed to fend off the fatal internal and external hemorrhage caused by the virus (Williams & Wilkins 1010). Where primates such as monkeys trigger Ebola virus, birds transmit Avian flu to humans and bats and civets pass on SARS to humans. Both Avian flu and SARS became pandemic in 1997 and 2003, respectively (Friedlander 111,117). But the worst epidemic that hit the whole world was the HIV virus which up to now, unlike the rest of these viruses which had been eventually contained , continued to rage without any cure in sight. THE HIV/AIDS EPIDEMIC The HIV virus or the human immunodeficiency virus is just as virulent as the hereinabove-mentioned viruses. While humanity was able to contain the aforesaid viruses, there is difficulty in restricting HIV because of the impossibility of restraining the sexual urges of 2 human beings of all gender. The best that authorities can do is to release warnings and to advise exercise of due care when engaging in sexual activities such as the use of condoms. The Catholic Church urges sexual abstention or exclusively limiting sex to one’s spouse. HIV and the disease that it generated AIDS or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome had become a cause of concern after some 25 million people all over the world had died and an estimated 40 million had carried the disease since the virus was first identified in 1981 (World Bank 1). It had become so pandemic that WHO or World Health Organization expressed concern and determination to stop the plague at all cost. It was estimated in 2007 that 33.2 million people had been infected with the virus and that some 2.1 million people had died after suffering untold and painful organic malfunctions. Of these around 330,000 children had perished . WHO further declared that “AIDS remains a leading cause of mortality worldwide and the primary cause of death in sub-Saharan Africa” (UNAIDS, WHO 1,6). In North America in 2007, 1.3 million were estimated to be carrying within them the HIV virus while 31,000 were infected in that same year. Also in 2007 alone, 21,000 died (UNAIDS,WHO 7) . What is so alarming is the unusual rate of HIV infection in USA alone as the number of HIV cases escalates by leaps and bounds from year to year. In 1988, 100000 cases were reported. That doubled to 200,000 in 1990 and further balooned to 300,000 in 1992. By December 1992, AIDS had claimed 200,000 lives making AIDS the leading cause of death for men aged 25 to 44 and the fourth for women belonging to the same age group (Auerbach et al 1). What further distresses is that the 1.3 million North Americans carrying the HIV virus are certainly marching to their graves at the most opportune time because there is yet no discovered cure for the disease. 3 What is even more bloodcurdling is that all these 1.3 million AIDS victims are potential sources of further AIDS transmission that will result to an elevation of the disease to an even higher pandemic level. While Ebola virus was confined only to the sub-Saharan countries of Zaire and Sudan and the Avian flu was by and large restricted to HongKong and its environs and while SARS was mostly circumscribed in China, AIDS and its virus HIV are spread out all over the four corners of the world excepting only Antarctica. 162 countries have admitted and reported AIDS infection and deaths while the rest are mum on the matter or have underreported AIDS cases (Miller 80). All continents and regions are affected. “No country is immune” (World Bank 2). The AIDS epidemic is to the world the sword of Damocles which is hovering above it carrying an impending doom which if left unbridled can be catastrophic. The problem is so pressing that the executive director of UNAIDS blurted out “HIV/AIDS is unequivocally the most devastating disease we have ever faced, and it will get worse before it gets better” (World Bank xxiii). The first known AIDS case was detected in Sao Paolo, Brazil in the late 1970’s (Stimson et al 263). But the virus was first identified and reported in San Francisco by Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in June 1981 (Boyer & Indira 201). Since then chemists, other scientists and researchers worked frenetically, racing against time to identify the virus, its characteristics and find ways to isolate it and discover remedies and cure for the disease. For the meantime, thousands were affected with the mysterious virus and thousands 4 more fell by the wayside, all complete goners in the fight against that virus. On April 23, 1984, Dr. Robert Gallo of the National Cancer Institute proclaimed his discovery that the HIV virus caused AIDS and that he was able to isolate the virus and identified it as RNA-containing with tumor-causing properties and which he first named as HTLV-III later renamed HIV (Goldberg et al 491). Simultaneous with this, the Montagnier-led Pasteur Institute team was able to successfully isolate and culture the HIV virus and afterwards view it using the electron microscope (Grmek, Maulitz &Duffin 74). This opened the floodgates for the determination of the structure and life cycle olf the HIV virus. The electron microscope revealed it to be an RNA virus, a typical retrovirus,with a globular shape and possessing a high molecular weight. The RNA nucleus is enclosed in a protein capsule and this comprises the “nucleoid” or “core” which in turn is surrounded by a package made up of two glycoproteins and a lipid. One single HIV virus “contains two copies of RNA, reminiscent of chromosome pairs (Grmek,Maulitz & Duffin 77). Furthermore, the virus is so genetically simple and contains only a tiny piece of genetic information that it is practically innocuous and not capable of killing cells, contended molecular biologist Dr. Peter Duensberg. AIDS researchers such as Dr. Papadopulos-Eleopulos came up with the discovery that the HIV virus alone cannot inflict and cause AIDS. AIDS is instead triggered by the presence of immunosuppressive co-factors such as “recreational and pharmaceutical drug use, recurrent infections, chronic use of antibiotics, poor nutrition and pollution, as well as many pschological co-factors such as stress, fear and despair”. Dr. Papadopulos-Eleopulos concluded that AIDS develop in the human body because of the 5 simultaneous presence of the HIV virus and an “excessive and prolonged oxidative stress in the body, caused by multiple co-factors such as drug use, infections, and semen” (Goldberg et al 493) . Through blood tests of those suffering from symptoms of AIDS, it had been eerily observed that the number of CD4 cells in their bodies had drastically been reduced. CD4 cells include T lymphocyte cells, macrophages and monocytes, the main components of the body’s immune system. These CD4 cells function as soldiers fighting invading germs or viruses that may cause infection and thus neutralizing them (Boyer & Indira 202). A healthy person usually contains from 900 to 1,600 CD4 cells but when infected with the HIV virus, his CD4 cells plummet from 500 to 0 (Goldberg et al 494). This drastic reduction of the CD4 cells is caused by the brutal invasion of HIV viruses in cells containing CD4 molecules. The HIV virus attaches itself to such cell which it uses as factory for its replication. This viral replication uses the cell’s biochemicals until the cell is totally overwhelmed and the cell’s immune system is exhausted and then forced to disintegrate thus bringing down the CD4 count to as low as zero (Weeks & Alcamo 74). The resultant debility of the body and the loss of its immunity to infection makes the body vulnerable to variety of diseases such as pneumonia (pneumocystis carinii), tuberculosis, encephalitis, meningitis,lymphoma, various cancers, herpes simplex and Kaposi’s sarcoma which is a rare tumor in the blood vessels of the skin (Nelson et al 301-3). There are several modes of transmitting AIDS from an infected person to another. The primary and most common mode is unprotected sexual contact whether vaginal, oral or anal with an infected person Others are sharing of intravenous syringes and needles, breast feeding and perinatal transmission, blood transfusion and contact of seminal or vaginal or oral fluids of 6 infected person with the mucous membrane or broken skin of an uninfected person (Carpenito-Moyet 426). The Impact of Homophobia One of the sorry effects of the HIV epidemic in the whole world is the worsening homophobia experienced by gays, lesbians and bisexuals . Homophobia is defined as the “irrational fear or intolerance of homosexuality” (Worell 1098). Prior to the advent of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, homosexuals had already experienced pervasive bigotry, antipathy and prejudice in practically all aspects of social life. Homosexuality had often been lambasted in several pulpits all over the world as unnatural, perverse, sinful and an aberration of God’s will. The movies depicted them as sources of comical fun who were mainly revolting, outrageous and disgusting.The moral condemnation had led to repression and many were forced to ‘hide in their closets’for fear that they may be publicly reviled and taunted or that they may lose their jobs or that they may be physically or psychologically threatened especially after the Stonewall riots and raids. Legal discriminations abounded while civil laws left them out in the cold in the exercise of their supposed civil rights. The twenty first century however, saw the emergence of the recognition of gay rights. Partly due to intellectual liberalism and to the efforts of the Gay Liberation Movement in the 1970’s, gays made their influence felt first in the municipal level and later in the national level. In 1977, an openly gay Harvey Milk was elected Supervisor in San Francisco. Earlier in 1974, the American Psychological Association was pressured to remove “homosexuality from its list of medical diseases and disorders” (Andryszewski 14). In late 1970’s ordinances from many US cities were enacted prohibiting discrimination against 7 gays. These included the cities of “Detroit, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington” (Andryszewski 16). Finally in 1979, 4 openly gay state judges were appointed by California governor Jerry Brown; the Democratic Party pushed for the passage of several gay rights legislation and the policy held by the Immigration and Naturalization Service that excluded all gays from entering the country was proclaimed to be unconstitutional and later on repealed (Andryszweski 21). But all the momentum gained by the gays reached a standstill when the HIV/AIDS epidemic started raging in early 1980’s especially when reports reached that the plague was gay-triggered. Medical reports in New York in early 1981 showed that homosexual men from New York’s gay community were dying via a rare malignant disease. In March 1981, there were 8 cases of young, homosexual patients showing symptoms of Kaposi’s sarcoma in 3 New York hospitals. In only a matter of days, 4 of the homosexuals were already dead belying it to be plain Karposi’s sarcoma which is usually benign and not fatal. Some New York physicians then jumped to the conclusion that “a new disease had begun killing homosexuals and destroying their immune systems”(Grmek et al 7). Almost simultaneously, also in New York, 5 cases of what appeared to be pneumocystosis were detected and it was further noted and emphasized that all were homosexuals. The physicians concluded that “an association between some aspects of homosexual lifestyle or disease acquired through sexual contacts and Pneumocystis pneumonia in this population” were clearly evident (Grmek et al 5). In San Francisco, symptomatic Karposi’s sarcoma was also detected among the city’s gay community. As early as the 1970’s the gay community of the city’s Castro District had been a 8 source of deep concern by medical authorities especially the CDC or Centers for Disease Control because diseases such as “hepatitis B, syphilis, venereal warts….amebiasis,giardiasis and shigellosis” had become increasingly prevalent among the sexually active male population in that district (Janes et al 162). Thus, when 100 cases of that rare disease showing up as Kaposi’s sarcoma broke out in the area, the CDC was not the least shocked. As part of its policy to contain the syndrome, the Kaposi’s Sarcoma Clinic was established by late 1981. Although the gay community didn’t feel that their lives were threatened or that there was a serious epidemic underway, CDC believed the syndrome had a long incubation period. Its growing concern was further bolstered by the finding that “one in 350 gay men in that part of the city had already been diagnosed as having AIDS under the strict CDC diagnostic criteria” by January 1983 (Janes et al 165). Eventually the “gay plague” burst all over the country and a homophobia raged all over. This policy of hatred was further stoked by rumors spreading like wildfire about the gay deaths caused by the gay plague. When the publication Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report bannered in its July 4, 1981 headline the story titled “Kaposi’s sarcoma and Pneumocystis pneumonia among homosexual men---New York and California”. The story went on to report that “Kaposi’s sarcoma had been diagnosed in 26 men, 20 in New York and 6 in California. 8 had died, in less than 2 years….All were homosexual” (Grmek et al 7). Other papers picked the story and there was bedlam and unprecedented homophobia and antigay discrimination. “Some medical personnel refused to treat AIDS patients. Some ambulance workers and police refused to touch patients who appeared to be gay. Some funeral homes refused to handle AIDS cases” (Andryszewski 24). And the gay abomination spilled out across the oceans. In a mass protest 9 staged by Christian fundamentalists in Tasmania, Australia, posters were distributed bearing the caption: “Stop AIDS now: execute homos”. In Zimbabwe, members of a local gay organization distributing AIDS pamphlets in a book fair were not only verbally harassed but were subjected to “mob harassment and threats of physical violence” (Kurtz & Turpin 142). Since the AIDS outbreak gays had to weather not only verbal abuse but other crimes inflicted on them ranging from slander to homicide. These spawned the formation of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force who were able to document thousands of hate crimes against gays encompassing “murders, assaults, hate-group activity, police abuse, arson and vandalism, threats and harassment, campus violence, other AIDS-related violence….and defamation “. The animosity against gays were so widespread that the Task Force lobbied for Congress to enact the Hate Crimes Statistics Act which included antigay violence protection. After lengthy, incessant pressures, the said Act was finally approved in 1990 (Cabaj & Stein 802). All these hatred, violence, discriminations and homophobia had affected gays everywhere especially those awaiting sure deaths from the AIDS scourge and those who were in quandary whether the AIDS virus had already sought haven inside their bodies. In response to these dilemma , emerged six major AIDS service organizations , which were non-profit and purely grass-roots based and staffed mainly by gay volunteers and their friends. Because homophobia gripped even the national and local governments and the usual community and health-care services, these ASOs took it upon themselves to provide not only material needs to the AIDS-afflicted but also individual and group-therapy sessions presided over by professional social service specialists and crisis intervention counsellors. They also provided legal advisers and 10 financial aid guidance and even support groups who minister to the sick and do chores for them. Moreover they provided up-to-date HIV/AIDS information and seminars as well as interpatient communication using the Internet . One particular ASO, the Gay Men’s Health Crisis “distributed 30,000 health recommendation brochures and fielded almost 5,000 emergency hotline calls and created a patient service program” (Huber 12). The other ASOs were the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, AIDS Project Los Angeles, AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts, AID Atlanta and the Howard Brown Clinic (Huber 11). The homophobia generated by AIDS and the fear of contagion had spawned restrictive,discriminatory, coercive and compulsory legislative measures designed to control the epidemic. These trampled the human rights of the AIDS victims. These legislations empowered public health authorities to put suspected people under surveillance, isolate or segregate them, force them to take HIV/AIDS compulsory tests, coerce them to undergo mandatory hospitalization against their will, trace their every move and action, restrict their behavior and other restrictive measures to ensure further transmission of the virus. All of these violate the human rights of the suspected HIV carrier (Mann et al 547,550). The AIDS aflicted were virtually swamped by legislations that rob them of their human rights. In USA alone, more than 180 laws that were AIDS-related were passed in the years 1985-87 while “more than 840 bills appeared in state legislatures”(Mann et al 547). The United Nations and other international human rights bodies rose to the occasion to come to the aid of the AIDS-afflicted. These have pressured governments to make good their implementation of human rights treaties and protect the human rights of AIDS patients. The UN 11 Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights had elicited from the government of Denmark the position of respecting the human rights of those afflicted with AIDS while striving to avoid the spread of AIDS by “relying on voluntary treatment, consent at all stages and anonymity” and emphasized prevention through information. The same UN body also was able to extract from the government of Netherlands the stand of emphasizing “individuals’ responsibility for themselves and their own health care”(Mann et al 572). Hence, the trend will be on dialogues between governments and the international human rights bodies to find a balance between protection and promotion of human rights and dignity and the promotion of public health. Conclusion The HIV/AIDS epidemic had spawned a fear of the disease, the fear of contagion and most especially homophobia. While there is yet no cure for the disease, the AIDS-afflicted suffer from the hatred, the discrimination, the physical and psychological violence inflicted on them by a judgmental society. Meantime, ASOs or AIDS service organizations come to the aid of the afflicted to lend them succor and support. Meanwhile, governments enacted legislations by the bundles hoping to contain and prevent spread of the disease. These oftentimes, violated the human rights of the AIDS-afflicted stripping them of their freedom and their dignity. 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