AIDS increases among teen-agers
By Anna Herkamp
Summer
Reporter
The biggest increase in recent years of the number
of AIDS patients who have sought professional help are teenagers and
young adults. June 5 marked the anniversary of disease in the United
States. The disease has been publicly known for over 20 years and according
to a recent article by the Associated Press, "a new government survey
suggests gay men and bisexuals too young to remember the disease's explosive
first years are contracting it at alarming rates."
Some of these young patients are not even high
school age.
Lynn Nelson, deputy director of Area IV Agency
on Aging and Community Services, Inc., said in recent years funding
for not-for-profit organizations dealing with AIDS patients has gotten
worse instead of better— despite the increase of AIDS cases.
The Area IV Agency on Aging and Community Action
Program is a not-for-profit organization that deals with multiple funding
for different medical needs. The agency also specializes in aid for
patients who have HIV or AIDS.
Rise of AIDS
The reasons for the rise of AIDS cases in young
people are complicated. Nelson said the biggest reason isn't lack of
education, but lack of communication. People have a hard time talking
to potential sexual partners about the disease, she said.
People have been getting mixed signals because
of the success of certain AIDS treatments, so people are led to believe
that if you have a strong enough immune system, you won't contract the
disease, or you don't have to worry about safe sex, she said.
In the future, drugs may possibly be rendered ineffective
if people do not take their medication correctly, which they don't in
many cases, said Nelson.
"Knowing the virus, I believe a resurgence of AIDS
is possible because of how the virus mutates," she said.
Another reason AIDS may not seem like such an issue
in recent years is because of the romanticism love and sex in pop culture.
A common attitude that young adults may be extracting
from television is, "If 'Will and Grace' or anyone on 'Friends' doesn't
have to worry about AIDS, then why should I?" said Nelson.
"Somewhere along the line, the message has been
lost."
It's not that the message isn't out there. People
aren't tired of hearing about it, they're numbed, she said. It isn't
as if you can look at a person and tell if they've got the disease or
not. It's a conversation you must be willing to have, she said. "Those
questions are hard to answer when you're trying to date," she said.
David Sanders, associate professor of biological
sciences, whose main research area is structural virology, agrees that
the reason for the jaded public attitude is "Absolute complacency."
While young people may be getting the message that
they simply don't have to worry about it, Sanders says it's the same
as any other social ill: people still smoke, people still drive drunk.
"People only worry about school shootings after there has been one,"
he said. They won't worry about it until it happens to them, he said.
Social Awareness
While the social awareness in recent has not been
what it was in the early '80s, the scientific advances made in the past
20 years have been tremendous.
AIDS is a relatively easy disease to understand
though there is no known cure. The HIV virus is actually easier to understand
than the Herpes virus. Because there are more directions from which
to attack Herpes, it is more treatable than AIDS, which has a more limited
number of places from which to treat the disease, said Sanders.
One of the main reasons AIDS research has been
so successful is that exploration of the disease actually came from
earlier attempts at looking at other types of viruses. Some of the research
evolved from diseases that did not affect human beings at all. One study
focused entirely on a retro-virus that hurts chicken populations. The
research came about from curiosity, said Sanders.
"Had it not been for that previous 'irrelevant'
research, we wouldn't have been able to make any progress with HIV whatsoever."
"It wasn't targeted research. Research that comes
about purely from scientific curiosity is the engine that drives the
scientific community," he said. It is important to remember that the
most valuable research and development come from non-directed research,
not research that necessarily has a 'cause,' he said.
Bad Advocacy?
Over the past 20 years, advocacy groups have fueled
research for AIDS. However, this public awareness has worked against
the scientific advancement as well.
Because of advocacy groups, the Food and Drug Administration
has sped up human trials for new treatments. "This shortens trials in
laboratories just to get out the drugs on the market. This type of behavior
does nothing to help patients in the long run," Sanders said. While
advancement is something no one is going to argue with, speeding up
research too quickly can hinder development.
While advocacy groups are important, issues they
present to the public might also hurt research. Many times, advocates
will speak out about the high prices of drugs in pharmaceutical companies.
While the drugs are expensive, Sanders argues, if they didn't cost so
much, research and development of drugs wouldn't be possible at all.
"Many drugs don't make a single penny," he said.
"It takes a huge amount of money to study drugs, many of which don't
even lead to a treatment or therapy." When you figure in the cost of
research and development as well as failures, development is expensive,
he said. "To regard it (expensive drugs ) that simply is short-term
thinking. You must look at the long-term implications."
The Future
Sanders said the best way to educate people is
to have continual education at all levels. Also, having political leaders
who are scientifically informed and committed to long-term research
is what will help the future of AIDS research in this country," he said.
Nelson said the next step is a newer type of education
about AIDS. "I'd love for people to be able to learn how to talk to
on another openly," she said.
"My 16 year old can tell me about AIDS, but does
he have the skills to talk to someone about it?" she said.
How we deal with it on a one on one basis is the
next step, she said.
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