@persephonemag / persephonemag.tumblr.com
Here in the U.S., we are coming to the end of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend and a week that has brought us the non-indictment of Darren Wilson, the ensuing protests that clashed with the capitalist idea of the start of the Christmas shopping season. That news and commentary have been covered here and here by the other lovely writers on this site.
But the rest of the world had newsworthy…
This past week, several notable people have passed away, but we’ve also got some bright spots in the world of medicine and music to share. Let’s get to it.
(more…)
Friday News Bites: Rogue Cows, Racial Bias, and More
Today’s newsy roundup inspires a lot of, “WTF is wrong with you?” commentary, but I’ve got some…
Science News: 7/26/13
So much science news, so little time! The last three weeks have brought us a lot of cool stories…
Protect Yourself, Before You Wreck Yourself: Safe Oral Sex
Q. My boyfriend and I haven’t had sex, but we have done oral. I was talking to a friend recently…
Hey babies! Hows everyones afternoon (morning, noon, or night) going? We saw some action, but maybe you didnt catch it all! Either way, check out these three articles from yesterday that will titillate and tantalize.
Perhaps more than ever, young people are having trouble pinpointing that which they want to achieve in and with their lives. Or rather, perhaps this trouble is made even more problematic than it has been before, because of economic and political situations which no longer allow any kind of doubt or inquiry. With degrees becoming exponentially more expensive and jobs apparently growing ever scarcer, young people may grow anxious or depressed. What is there to look forward to when you know you’re going to be saddled with crippling debt or with the weight of (in hindsight) bad decisions weighing you down, just because you were not afforded the privilege that some people in older generations (like myself) had: that privilege to search and inquire and make a mistake here or there. In the words of Albus Dumbledore, “Perhaps we sort too soon.” Perhaps we expect our young people to know too much about their own minds, persons, and lives at too young an age. Such expectations, which I believe our prevalent in our society, can weigh heavy on a mind.
Margaret Cho helped me become the brassy-mouthed, take-no-shit bitch I’d always hoped I’d become. Sure, I don’t fill my full potential every day, but there is always a steady supply of people who will throw down assaults at who you inherently are. Sometimes they are so incredibly blatant and sometimes they are just ignorant phrases repeated over and over. Either way, we are allowed our anger. We are allowed to be mad. We don’t need permission. We don’t need anyone to sanction it. Frankly, part of me thinks that saying all this isn’t even necessary. But like Cho brilliantly says, “If you are offended by my anger and my might at defending my borders and my people you do not deserve entry into my beloved and magnificent country.” Sometimes, that might just be a place to start.
The Batswana government has taken significant action against HIV/AIDS. Since 1986, there has been a government program devoted solely to HIV/AIDS issues, creating frameworks and goals for public policy aimed towards combating the disease. In 2008, the most recent year for which statistics are available, the government spent nearly 350 million USD on prevention, treatment, and care, only a third of which came from outside donors. That money went towards prevention campaigns, blood transfusion screening, and an incredibly widespread ART program that, between public and private sectors, reached 89.8 percent of the known HIV+ population. The Batswana government was the first to create a program devoted to combating mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS, and today, 94% of pregnant women receive the antiretroviral drugs necessary to strongly decrease the risk of transmission to the fetus. This has had a huge impact: in 1999, 4,600 children were born HIV+ whereas in 2007, 890 children were born with the disease. Thirty percent of households containing orphans received economic support from the government. All schools teach a detailed curriculum about HIV/AIDS, called TeachAIDS, a UNICEF-developed (and funded) tutorial on the disease.
The first case of AIDS was reported on June 5, 1981 in Los Angeles. Back then, it was only identified as Pneumocystis pneumonia, a form of a compromised immune system that, while itwasn’t HIV/ AIDS, indicated an immunocompromised patient who often had no real reason to be sick. Since that day in 1981, an estimated 25-30 million people have died from the virus and the current worldwide estimate of people living with HIV is 33.3 million. 15.9 million of those people are women, 2.5 million children. In 2009, an average of 2.2 million people were newly infected with the virus, and while actual deaths from AIDS are declining mainly thanks toantiretroviral treatments and new HIV infections are the lowest they have been since 1997 after peaking in 2005, it is still one of the fastest spreading and most destructive viruses in our world, primarily spreading and infecting in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Read more at Persephone Magazine
