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The HIV/AIDS pandemic striking South Africa is of historic proportions. More people are living with AIDS in South Africa than in any other country in the world. Just in the past decade, the life expectancy in South Africa has dropped from 67 to 43 years. The social and economic impact of this disease is hard to overstate. However, what is striking is the paucity of thoughtful, reflective scholarship and writing on the subject." AIDS and South Africa: The Social Expression of a Pandemic" addresses the economic, social and cultural impact of HIV/AIDS as it relates to South African society.

Based on interviews with nearly 80 doctors involved in the early years of the AIDS epidemic, this candid account details the palpable anxiety in the medical profession as it experienced a rapid succession of cases for which there was no clinical history.

Terrifying in its potential and devastating in its impact, AIDS is now widespread in a number of African countries. Estimates suggest that as many as five an a half million people on the continent are currently carrying the virus. The AIDS epidemic is among the most severe problems faced by Africans, already weakened by drought, poverty, civil war, and debt. Tony Barnett and Piers Blaikie, who have studied the impact of AIDS in Uganda, present a sensitive and compelling analysis of human cost of this dread disease in Africa.

Every minute a Nigerian man, woman, or child becomes infected with HIV. Soon Nigeria will be home to more people living with HIV than any other country in Africa. With 5 percent of its inhabitants already infected, Nigeria has reached the critical threshold that can catapult rates to nearly 40 percent of a country's population. The full magnitude of Nigeria's epidemic will be determined by its response now.

"AIDS in Nigeria" helps guide that response. Written by dozens of the country's leading HIV experts, the book explores the dynamics of the epidemic, analyzes prevention efforts, identifies crucial gaps, and formulates effective strategies for controlling the epidemic. Complementing the experts' words are the dramatic portraits of people whose lives have been forever transformed by AIDS. Their stories reveal the human costs of the epidemic--and the courage required to overcome it.

The devastating AIDS pandemic in Africa has placed the entire international community at a moral crossroads. Not just a medical challenge, AIDS also highlights complex moral and cultural dilemmas. In this book, the first to systematically examine the ethical implications of AIDS in Africa, internationally acclaimed experts address one of the most pressing issues in biomedical ethics and international health. They grapple with such troubling questions as: Do wealthy countries have a responsibility to respond to the African AIDS crisis? Is it moral for companies to make profits from AIDS drugs? Ought we to include children in drug trails? How should local cultures and religious beliefs influence treatment and prevention programs? What is the relationship between AIDS and poverty? This carefully constructed volume first sets the stage by describing the huge extent of the pandemic, as well as the significant problems with available data. Then, contributors discuss the various ethical paradigms within which the AIDS pandemic can be evaluated, from African villages and countries to the global system. Additional chapters then take on the ethical dimensions of central issues such as access to medication, transmission of the disease, vaccine trials, and traditional religious and cultural values.

This definitive textbook covers all aspects of HIV/AIDS in southern Africa, from basic science to medicine, sociology, economics and politics. It has been written by a highly-respected team of southern African HIV experts and provides a thoroughly researched account of the epidemic in the region. The book comprises eight sections, the first of which covers the numbers behind the epidemic, both as evolution and in their current state. This is followed by sections on the science of the virus, including its structure, diagnosis and spread. HIV risk factors and prevention strategies, focal population groups and the impact of AIDS in all aspects of South African life are discussed in the following four sections. The final sections examine the treatment of HIV and AIDS, the politics of AIDS, mathematical modelling and a discussion on the future of AIDS in South Africa.

This book critically examines the evolution of the policy response to AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa through the lens of feminist political economy lens, focusing on the relationship between neo-liberalism, the spread of AIDS and the hegemonic policy response. It explores the ways in which AIDS has been constructed as a "development" problem and how AIDS knowledges and institutions have evolved and have shaped interventions in the AIDS sector.

This book narrates with emotion and humility Braam's role, and others' parts, in what was the last and largest ANC operation against the apartheid regime.

Crystal methamphetamine, also known as "crystal meth," has rocked national news headlines as the often deadly party drug of choice for gay and bisexual men. The recent media blitz around the so-called "AIDS supervirus" was only one of virtually thousands of earlier stories that laid the blame for an outbreak of new HIV transmission among gay men on impaired judgment brought about by crystal meth use. The low-priced stimulant -- which can be snorted, smoked, ingested, or injected -- increases its user's heart rate, blood pressure, and stamina, while decreasing the need for food and sleep. Health experts estimate that 22 percent of all gay men have tried crystal meth at least once. Heterosexuals, including teenage girls, have also joined the millions of crystal meth users and addicts.
In "Suicide Tuesday, Duncan Osborne, the leading journalist on the topic of gay men and crystal meth, offers a critical, clear-eyed look on the history of crystal meth, its effect on gay men, its alleged link to HIV transmission, the gay community's response to the reported epidemic, as well as the media's role in fostering public awareness but also sex panic among gay people.

A Constructive Response to the Current Crisis of Confidence in the Professions

"For generations the professions have combined expert knowledge with public service in a proud sense of calling. Now the market economy threatens to reduce professions, along with every other sector of modern life, to a lowest common denominator. Sullivan's book offers understanding and hope to professionals seeking to recover their true calling."
— Robert N. Bellah, professor of sociology, emeritus, University of California at Berkeley and coauthor, Habits of the Heart and The Good Society

"Writing in the tradition of social critics as distinctive as Emile Durkheim, William Morris, and John Dewey, and drawing on recent research on the mastery of complex bodies of knowledge and traditions of practice in professional education, William Sullivan in Work and Integrity has given us an indispensable interpretation of the meaning of work for our time."
— Bruce Jennings, senior research scholar, The Hastings Center

"The mission of professional training is typically understood as developing expertise. In Work and Integrity, William Sullivan persuasively shows that those who educate the next generation of professionals should also be nurturing an ethic of 'civic professionalism, ' an understanding that the professions have a vital public responsibility. This is valuable, eye-opening reading for anyone who teaches— or depends on the professionalism of— professionals."
— David L. Kirp, professor, Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California at Berkeley

"Work and Integrity provides an invaluable lens for understanding the role of professions in American society. Byplacing the contemporary challenges of professionals in broader historical and social context, William Sullivan offers a highly insightful analysis of how best to promote their highest ethical aspirations."
— Deborah Rhode, Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law, Stanford University