HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus, is possibly the most politically charged microscopic object known to man.
Political camouflage, denial, lust, religious conflict, economic hardship, and even a few things that have to do with biology, make up HIV’s formidable bag of tricks. It joins the ranks of the rare few diseases, such as leprosy, that are capable of making their hosts not only ill, but socially outcast as well.
Unlike leprosy, this social quarantine does nothing to contain the spread of HIV, because HIV has few outward symptoms, and no symptoms that would tip off the uninformed observer. These peculiarities have allowed HIV to spread to the pandemic problem that it is now. Its unique biology will keep it going strong in the face of open war by the international community.
Anatomy of the Beast
HIV is a retrovirus, and that makes it considerably different from other viral diseases.
There are many types of viruses, and they work in many different ways, but to demonstrate, let us have a comparison between HIV and the rhinovirus (common cold).
The Rhinovirus invades cells in the respiratory tract and causes those cells to begin producing copies of the virus. The infected cells produce a chemical distress signal that causes swelling and calls the body’s immune system to attack the infected cells.
A cold is like a revolution. The enemy arrives, recruits among our poor and disenfranchised, overthrows cities, but is ultimately crushed by the careful use of a standing army and political maneuvering. Sometimes it wins, usually it loses.
HIV is different. HIV infects Helper T Cells primarily. It has a cell membrane borrowed from the host cell that spawned it, and infected cells do not give off any regular distress signs, making their destruction unlikely. Making it more unlikely is that the Helper T Cells are the ones that would normally be responsible for keeping viral infection under control.
HIV is like political corruption. One rogue agent gets inside and starts making bribes. Soon the whole police force is in on it and there is nothing the common folk can do. If it goes on too long, pretty soon you’re living in a police state. The real problem is that there is no reliable way to sort the good out from the bad, and removing them all is out of the question.
The Political Animal
The real horror of HIV is not in its remarkably effective reproduction, nor its truly genius means of evading the immune system, nor its ruthless habit of taking out the bodies defenses mafia-style.
The real horror of HIV is its effects on those who do not have it. HIV first entered the United States as a small epidemic within the homosexual community. Homosexuals had fewer rights and less respect at the time than they do now. Since they still have only limited respect or rights, we can safely say that they were nearly universally reviled by the general population.
The mysterious pattern of severe illness and death among the gay community did not meet the degree of public outcry that it would have if the disease had infected primarily cute children with bright futures. Those infected were blamed for their own misfortune, and the disease was regarded as little more than God’s punishment on the perverse.
In more contemporary times, African Bishops in the Catholic Church, concerned with enforcing the doctrines against artificial birth control, tell their communities that condoms do not prevent the spread of HIV, some even going so far as to claim that they cause it. African governments actively censor any mention of the existence of the disease, hoping that turning a blind eye will make it go away. The American youth, driven by what seems to be an increasing degree of social irresponsibility, fail to respond to political campaigns promoting condom use. State institutions favor the socially unlikely abstinence program and refuse to teach the use of condoms in sex education classes under pressure from religious groups.
Original Sin
Many Christian denominations teach the doctrine of original sin, which states that we are all born as sinners even before our first action because we inherit the crimes of our fathers and of Adam and Eve. Nothing can ever remove this sin, and though it may be forgiven, nothing can make it go away.
Society has let HIV get out of hand, and studies and progress suggest that HIV just might be incurable altogether. The prevention fight goes on, but advances on a cure or vaccine are few and far between.
The great pandemic of the 21st century is growing rapidly, and for the first time that disease is one that is minimally infectious. It isn’t spread by mosquitoes, or rats, or sneezes. It can’t be spread through food, and it has minimal survivability outside the human body. It spreads through sex, and needles. HIV requires intentional acts on the part of its host to spread, and they are acts that are not made more likely by the presence of the virus. HIV is a social disease, and it spreads for social, not biological reasons.
HIV is successful because it allows us to destroy ourselves, and it demonstrates that we need little help.
Image by ajcann
