December 01, 2002
World Aids Day.
You think that it will never hit you; you believe that it will never affect you. That it will somehow manage to pass you by, that those you love will be hale, safe and sound. That they will never feel the pain of loosing someone to a disease that slowly takes their life away. Then one day you wake up to realize that the world you left behind when you were younger, the place of childhood memories has been ravaged by a disease that no man can control.
There are 40 million people living with aids worldwide, 29.4 million of them live in the countries that I spent my youth in. There are friends I have left behind, people who were so close as to be called family, that live in the fear that they may one day lose someone to a disease that does not discriminate. There are those that I have known who have lost someone dear to them, a mother, a sister, a child. There are those who I have never met who have lost whole families, who have lost friends, who live with the fear that they will be next.
I know you hear this so often as that it has become irritating, something that we scoff at on occasion, but I shall say it again, for it bears repeating. Be safe; take precautions, for I cannot bear the thought of losing any more of you.
For more information, there are some very good sites that deal with aids, providing information, guidance, sites where you can lend a helping hand;
*Background info @ BBC
*NAT
*Pediatrics Aids Foundation
*Aids memorial quilt
*CDC
*Aids 101
*Aids.org
*AEGIS
*John Hopkins
* The body.
*Aids online
*UN Aids.