In recent years, the accessibility to appropriate medical assistance became a highly disturbing issue worldwide. In the United States, the terms of health inequalities and health disparities label the substantially disturbing differences in the quality of medical treatment for white Americans and African Americans (Singer & Baer, 2012). According to Singer and Baer (2012), not all population groups have equal access to modern medicine to benefit from its expanded capacity. The average life expectancy of African Americans is substantively lower in comparison with the white population (Singer & Baer, 2012). Racism and “the differences in the socioeconomic status” of ethnic minorities lead to a lack of access to health care and the prevalence of severe diseases such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, and ischemic heart disease (Singer & Baer, 2012, p. 177). However, a similar situation is observable in other parts of the world, as well.
From a personal perspective, public awareness of health inequalities and morbid diseases is immeasurably insufficient. Although 10,000 people die from AIDS every day with one death every 8 seconds, the dynamic in Africa is the most disastrous (Bilheimer, 2000). In some parts of Africa, a third of all pregnant women have AIDS, and appropriate medical treatment is inaccessible both to them and their children (Bilheimer, 2000). In India, women who have been diagnosed with HIV/AIDS inevitably face social discrimination, stigmatization, and accusation of immorality even if they became infected by their husbands (Van Hollen, 2013). I believe that this attitude and public ignorance are unacceptable as HIV/AIDS has already become a universal responsibility and the worst disease in human history. There should be no global issues left that will be ignored or hidden by the global community. And what can we do to change the perception of people with HIV/AIDS in our country?
References
Bilheimer, R. (Director). (2000).A closer walk [Video file]. Web.
Singer, M., & Baer, H. (2012). Introducing medical anthropology: A discipline in action (2nd ed.). Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press.
Van Hollen, C. (2013). Birth in the age of AIDS: Women, reproduction, and HIV/AIDS in India. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.