The Microscopic Demon

Leah Marrin

World Literature Honors

Ms. Bennett

March 13, 2015

The Microscopic Demon

The boy’s skin is covered in a permanent layer of dirt; a layer that’s been present since birth. His gaze stares out of the window in the dimly-lighted doctor’s office, viewing a row of poorly-assembled shacks, seeming as if they might fall over any minute. His doctor walks into the room with the gait of someone who is filled with dread. Words fill the boy’s ears: virus, impossible to treat, and I’m so sorry. He is living in South Africa. And he has just been diagnosed with HIV.

HIV/AIDS is a crisis spreading across the world, but concentrated heavily in South Africa. Standing for Human Immunodeficiency Virus, HIV is a sexually-transmitted virus that attacks the two most important immune system cells, T-cells and CD4 cells, and uses them to create copies of itself,  causing the immune system to be unable to fight back against the disease(What). After destroying enough of these cells, HIV turns into Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, otherwise known as AIDS. Once HIV has progressed to AIDS, patients generally live for only a year or two more, due to the lack of treatment available for this stage of the disease.

The nature of this disease mixed with all the problems plaguing South Africa makes it a region where HIV/AIDS can thrive. The main thing that causes this is poverty keeping people out of schools, which leads to the citizens of South Africa not being informed of the disease and how it can be transmitted(HIV/AIDS in South Africa). The government’s failure to address this problem has made the prevalence of HIV in South Africa rise up to a drastic 17.9% (HIV and AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa). This means that out of every 100 people living in South Africa, about 18 of them have HIV or AIDS. Life expectancies are retrograding. Household incomes are disappearing because the income earners are becoming ill or caring for their sick loved ones. South Africa is slowly sinking into a hole that they may never be able to crawl out of. Luckily, there are some advances being made in the hopes of treating this deadly disease. Antiretroviral therapy, the only treatment for HIV/AIDS that has a fairly high success rate, provides hope for South Africa. It keeps the level of HIV viruses in the body low and can even result in a normal life expectancy for the patient. Unfortunately, this treatment is extremely costly, due to the various medications involved. The kind of money spent on this treatment is an amount most South Africans wouldn’t make in a decade, but programs and organizations across the globe are working to administer this treatment for much lower costs in medical centers stationed in South Africa.

He is living in South Africa. And he has just been diagnosed with HIV alongside millions of others. But as he cries, his sobs echo across the world’s deserts, oceans, and mountains. It’s taken years and years, but soon, South Africa will no longer be plagued by a microscopic demon. Because help is on its way.

Bibliography:

"HIV and AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa." HIV and AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Feb. 2015.

"HIV/AIDS in South Africa." AIDS Foundation of South Africa. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2015.

"What Is HIV/AIDS?" What Is HIV/AIDS? Aids.gov, n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2015.