Aids Epidemic.

AIDS and the Government

One of our government's most troubling issues is the widespread epidemic of AIDS. It is a disease that is destroying much of the country's population. Not only is AIDS a relatively new disease (at least to the United States) it is a disease that is unstoppable right now due to the lack of conquering research. I believe that it is one of the most hateful diseases. It is a disease that many do not understand the consequences. It is money consuming to the government and destroying to the careless individuals who either do not worry and or are uneducated about it.

AIDS is a fairly new disease in the United States. The first reports of AIDS were in 1981. Since these cases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have closely monitored the outbreak in the United States. The cumulative sum in the AIDS cases reported in December of 1996 was 581,429.

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HIV infection

Of these cases the total numbers of deaths were 362,004. This left the number of people living with HIV at 76,664 and 216,769 for the people living with AIDS. Of the cases reported 5.5 percent, were reported from non-metropolitan statistical areas (CDC 1996). Rural statistics were not published in the CDC report.

The outbreak of aids was first noticed in major urban cities. This obviously made urban areas the concentration in the efforts to fight the disease. Later small numbers of cases were reported in rural areas. According to the CDC, the number of AIDS cases in non-metropolitan statistical areas between 1991 and 1992 increased 9.4 percent as compared to 3.3 percent in metropolitan statistical areas. Non-metropolitan statistical areas, as a group, experienced a 69 percent increase in the rate of AIDS-defining illnesses among men who have sex with men between 1989 and...