Mandatory AIDS Testing

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Term Paper Title	Mandatory AIDS Testing
# of Words	1879
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	7.52

Mandatory AIDS Testing

Mandatory AIDS Testing

AIDS has become a worldwide epidemic that has struck every identifiable group.
However, persons who are considered to be in a high-risk group of contracting
HIV, the disease believed to cause AIDS, are still stigmatized by the media and
other professionals as being diseased and abnormal.  It is quite surprising
still that this type of stereotype still exists now in our gender-bending
society.  No longer do only gays, prostitutes, bisexual men, intravenous drug
users contract HIV, the heterosexual community is also facing the epidemic at
phenomenon increases. It is estimated that heterosexual transmission accounts
for 75% of all AIDS cases in the world.(Video, CBC In Review)  And still
individuals persist that AIDS is a gay disease and that if one is not gay, one
is immune  from it.  No one is immune to from AIDS.  Until a vaccine and cure is
discovered for AIDS, the numbers will increase and people will keep dying.
Therefore it is of vital importance to educate people about AIDS and to promote
safer sex.  The key word now is prevention.  Among many proposed policies to
help prevent AIDS infection, one of the most controversial is mandatory AIDS
testing.  Mandatory AIDS testing is theoretically very effective, however, when
it is applied, it is not practical at all because one is dealing with human
nature, the odd nature of the virus itself, and also all of the stigmas that are
attached to AIDS.  Therefore, not only will mandatory AIDS testing not prevent
HIV infection, it will indirectly increase HIV infection because of the adverse
effect it will have on voluntary testers. One of the major flaws of mandatory
AIDS testing is that "it provides people with a false sense of security."(Greig,
p68)  When one goes for AIDS testing or more accurately an HIV antibody test
which is also know as the ELISA test (Kolodny, p42), one tests for the presence
of HIV antibodies not for the virus itself.  Our bodies manufacture antibodies
to fight against foreign infections, therefore the presence of HIV antibodies
indicates that the person is infected with HIV and is considered a carrier and
may infect others.  However, if the person is infected recently enough, these
antibodies might not show up in the test because it can take the body as long as
six months to develop these antibodies.  This period of time is known as the
window period.  So a person whose test returns with a negative HIV status may be
in fact a carrier and n...

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