|
Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Who says Aids doesn't matter?
By Henrylito D. Tacio
"WE ARE sitting on the tip of an iceberg and we don't know how big the base is," disclosed Dr. Manuel Dayrit, head of the Department of Health (DOH), during a conference organized by various bodies including the World Health Organization (WHO) in Manila recently.
He reported that the Philippines had 2,200 confirmed cases of HIV and 676 cases of Aids according to the health department's National Epidemiology Center. The figure is cumulative from 1984, the year when the first Aids case was reported in the country.
"Low and slow" is how the health experts describe the prevalence and growth rate, respectively, of the HIV/Aids epidemic in the Philippines. Will this remain forever? "Because of the dynamics of HIV/AIDS, we have no guarantee that HIV incidence in the Philippines will always remain relatively 'low and slow,'" argued former president Fidel V. Ramos, one of the country's top HIV/Aids advocate.
"It could still blow up into huge epidemiologic proportions quite rapidly at any time, as we have seen happen in some of our neighboring countries--if we return to a general attitude of complacency."
Dr. Nafis Sadik, United Nations special envoy for HIV/Aids in Asia, warned that an explosion of the epidemic in the Philippines is very possible--like what happened in Vietnam. Part of the reason, she pointed out, is that "high risk behavior" exists in the Philippines.
"The global HIV/Aids pandemic shows no signs of slowing," deplored Dr.Peter Piot, executive director of the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/Aids (Unaids), an inter-agency body coordinating HIV/Aids work throughout the world.
HIV--the human immunodeficiency virus--is a virus that kills the body's "CD4 cells" (also called T-helper cells, which assist the body fight off infection and disease).
It was first identified by Dr. Luc Montagnier and his colleagues at the Pasteur Institute in France in 1983. Classified as a retrovirus, HIV has the ability to replicate its own genetic material within the nucleus of the human cell it invades.
Outside the human body, HIV is relatively fragile and can be easily killed by household disinfectants. Once inside the body, there is no way a person can eliminate the virus.
HIV progressively weakens the body's immune defense system, until it is no longer able to fight off infections, many of which are normally harmless.
When the immune system is severely damaged by HIV, several opportunistic infections are present at once.
Opportunistic infections or indicator diseases affecting people with HIV include tuberculosis, Kaposi's sarcoma (a tumor primarily affecting the skin), pneumonia, herpes, shingles and weight loss.
Death is not caused directly by HIV, but by one or more infections.
"Aids (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) is a lethal syndrome because the progressive damage to the body's immune system leaves a person highly susceptible to contracting certain diseases," explains Dr. Dominic Garcia, an infectious disease specialist and official of the Aids Society of the Philippines.
Dr. Garcia said that the transmission of HIV requires contact with a body fluid that contains the virus or infected cells.
According to the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), you cannot get HIV: by working with or being around someone who has HIV; from sweat, spit, tears, clothes, drinking fountains, phones, toilet seats, or through everyday thing like sharing a meal; from insect bites or stings; from donating blood; and from a closed-mouth kiss (but there is a very small chance of getting it from open-mouthed kissing with an infected person because of possible blood contact).
How can you protect yourself from getting infected? Don't have sex. If you do, make this decision: have sex only with one partner you know who you know doesn't have HIV and is only having sex with you.
Better still, marry that person. If you're single and can't help not having sex, be safe--use condom.
Fr. James Keenan, S.J. says that it is morally acceptable for sexual partners to use condoms if only to prevent them from contracting HIV. But just a reminder: the condom does not provide 100-percent protection.
Some don'ts: Don't share needles and syringes used to inject drugs, vitamins, or for tattooing or body piercing. Don't share razors or toothbrushes because of the possibility of contact with blood.
If you think you have been infected with HIV, seek help immediately. While no cure is available at present, existing drugs do increase life expectancy and quality of life for PLWHAs. Currently, there are three classes of drugs available to treat HIV infection: nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, and protease inhibitors. "HIV usually develops resistance to any of these drugs when they are used alone," warns the Merck manual. "Resistance can develop after a few days to several months of use, depending on the drug and the person."
In the absence of a vaccine or treatment that can cure the disease, prevention remains the best antidote.
"Education through the media in whatever form is still the only potent vaccine available in the fight against the dreaded disease," explained Ramos during the launching of the FVR Excellence Award on HIV/Aids for Media.
Even in schools, HIV/Aids must be taught, according to Dr. Dayrit. "HIV/Aids needs to be brought out into the open," he said. "Young people need to be told that they are not invincible and we have to start telling people that they should start taking responsibility for their own sexual behavior."
For Bisaya stories from Davao. Click here. (April 5, 2005 issue)
Write letter to the editor.Click here.
Join the Sun.Star message board.Click here. |
|
[return to top]
[home]
[network page]
|
LOCAL NEWS
BUSINESS
OPINION
SPORTS
LIFESTYLE
FEATURE
SUPERBALITA
WEEKEND
|
