United against AIDS?
A special session of the United Nations suggests that the threat posed by AIDS has been acknowledged by the world’s politicians. How much action will follow?
MEASURED in nature's terms, HIV is a success. In the 20 years since its effects were first medically recognised, the immuno-deficiency virus is thought to have infected almost 60m of its primary host, people, and that number grows by 16,000 a day. But, as Greek philosophers knew, man, not nature, is the measure of all things. And in human terms HIV is a disaster. Of those 60m people, more than 22m have already died of AIDS, the disease it causes. Most of the rest will die soon.
This article appeared in the Science & technology section of the print edition under the headline “United against AIDS?”
From the June 30th 2001 edition
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