Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has affected many people in Africa:
Children become orphans and their grandparents are obligated to take care of them.
The infrastructure of Africa suffers because the continent's adults are dying of the disease, lessening the number of doctors, teachers, and other important workers.
Children can inherit the disease through their parents before birth.
Future generations will suffer because there will be no one to educate them or run the country if AIDS continues its rampage.
Foreign countries are burdened with helping Africa's struggle to conquer AIDS by sending money, resources, medication, and education to the continent.
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AIDS can be contracted by:
Inheriting the disease from infected parents.
Sharing needles with an infected person, whether it be through a blood transfusion or by taking drugs.
Having sex with an infected individual.
AIDS is worse in Africa because:
"Although prices are dropping for AIDS drugs in poor African countries, the barely existent health care system, poor roads and communications and the crushing stigma surrounding the disease make effective treatment a fantasy" (Nessman).
"The vast majority cannot afford drugs that could prolong their lives" ("Drug Firms Claim South Africa Failing to Take Up Cheap AIDS Drugs Offers").
"...the government had balked at offers of cut-price and even free anti-AIDS drugs, saying that it did not have the facilities to properly administer the drug" ("South Africa OKs Free AIDS Drug").
"Some of these drugs must be taken with food to work effectively, for example. So in nations on the edge of famine, they will not do much good" (Caplan).
