H.G. Wells – a perennial favorite of mine – once wrote that "human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe."
That has never been more clear than this past year. But, the latest humanity-inspired sign of such catastrophe hit the wires last week.
According to MAC AIDS Fund survey, which polled citizens of nine countries, AIDS remains a mystery. To wit, more than 40 percent of the respondents had no idea that AIDS is always fatal.
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Oh, it gets worse. Not only do most people believe there's a cure for the disease, roughly half of those surveyed believed that most HIV-positive patients were receiving treatment. (For the record, based on last year's numbers, that number is closer to 20 percent.)
Nevertheless, these misconceptions about a hardly low-key epidemic still can't stop the hate. Half of the survey respondents expressed discomfort with the idea of simply walking next to an HIV-infected person.
And these aren't under-developed, Third World pockets of information isolation, either. We're talking industrialized nations boasting informed citizens. In theory, anyway. The countries surveyed included the United States, United Kingdom, Russia, France, China, India, Mexico, Brazil and South Africa.
Kind of helps put the whole wellness thing in perspective, huh? Well, it should, anyway. Before foisting much more health care responsibility on the consumers – where, no doubt, it belongs – we might want to make sure they're properly trained and educated to make those decisions. We make teenagers take a test before handing over the car keys, don't we? Is this that much of a stretch?
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