Etiket aids

Kristin Ofer “We are not afraid of HIV but prejudices,” was the main slogan used during the events in Istanbul marking the World AIDS Day. The events provided an opportunity to change the main medical topic that is the swine flu that everybody has been talking about for several months. The flu, or more scientifically, the H1N1 virus, is dangerous bur curable. But HIV is not curable but fortunately unlike the swine-flu we can control the spreading of HIV. “HIV does not mean helplessness,” was another slogan of the World Aids Day in Turkey. 1st of December was designated as the World AIDS day by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1988 to draw attention to the disease. For the last 21 years activists and experts all over the world are tackling with the medical but also the social problems presented by the disease. Since 1985 about 2,500 people in Turkey had been officially registered as infected with HIV. In contrast to about 75 Million people living in Turkey the number of HIV infected persons does not seem impressive but the estimated number of unreported cases is expected to be rather high. According to the WHO’s country profile on Turkey HIV-tests are mostly limited to the urban centres. Actually half of them are registered within the boundaries of the province of Istanbul. Istanbul was the centre of the activities of the World Aids Day in Turkey. The events to mark the World AIDFS Day in Turkey were organized by the “Pozitif Yaşam Derneği”, the Turkish branch of “Positive Life Association”, a NGO which has been founded in order to build a network among people living with HIV/AIDS. They want to ensure that infected people have better access to treatment, to improve their living standards, to strengthen them and their relatives […]