Limited Resources for Prevention and Treatment of AIDS and HIV in Bay County Florida

Essay by mbuzbeeUniversity, Bachelor'sA-, January 2004

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Running Head: LIMITED RESOURCES FOR PREVENTION AND TREATMENT

Limited Resources for Prevention and Treatment

of AIDS and HIV in Bay County Florida

Melissa Buzbee

University of Wyoming

Limited Resources for Prevention and Treatment

of AIDS and HIV in Bay County Florida

In big cities, AIDS no longer carries the stigma it did when the first cases where discovered 20 years ago. People talk of managing the disease with powerful drug cocktails that prolong lives. The world's attention has turned to Africa, where millions are dying from the uncontrolled spread. But in the rural Bay County area of Florida this disease is far from manageable. Nearly four out of 100 HIV tests come back positive, twice the state average. More than half the people who tested positive for HIV in the county last year had developed into full-blown AIDS, many having suspected the diagnosis but delayed getting tested out of fear, ignorance or both.

The problem is reaching near epidemic numbers in this area but the resources available to combat this spread are becoming more and more limited or are being eliminated all together. This topic was chosen in order to bring attention to the county leaders and to help persuade them to become active in enhancing the treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS in the county and the surrounding area.

The number of new AIDS cases reported in Bay County from 1997 to 2001 has steadily increased from 11 to 20. These numbers may not seem large but in relation to the population size, they are alarming. Bay County's population is just barely over 140,000 and the rate of AIDS per 100,000 people has risen from 7.61 to 13.66 in just four years (Department of Health, Office of Planning, Evaluation and Data Analysis, 2003). At this rate, Bay County is projected...