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A Call for Immediate Relief

Linda Macrae






























The devastation and horror of HIV/AIDS shows no signs of being brought under control without the release of the Anti-Viral drugs to fight this epidemic. Since the early 1980’s more than 32 million people have succumbed to this deadly disease, and more people of all classes, ages, and races continue to become infected. AIDS/HIV has been labeled by some as the “genocide of a generation” UPDATE), but yet life-saving and life-enhancing drugs have been researched, developed, and marketed in many of the developed countries.
Antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) and their equivalents can greatly reduce the number and severity of HIV/AIDS illness, and improve the quality and duration of life. Yet for many complicated and economic reasons these drugs remain beyond the reach of the majority of people with HIV/AIDS. In the hardest hit areas such as Africa and Asia this disease is killing more than 16,000 people, and upwards of three million people worldwide every year (UPDATE). Of the 6 million of those infected in developed countries only 300,000 have direct access to the Antiretroviral drugs. This situation is escalating now and HIV/AIDS will most likely cause 68 million more deaths by the year 2020 (FACT).
The overwhelmingly abject failure to provide this life-saving medication when there is the means (no matter what excuse, argument or rationale is presented) is barbaric, merciless, inhumane, and a gross violation of human rights. The statistics are staggering yet heart wrenching on the impact of these individual lives and the community itself. HIV/AIDS drains the human and institutional capacities that drive a sustainable development. This disease...