HIV was a serious disease from the beginning, but no one wanted to take notice it in. It came from chimpanzees in Africa, it is believed to have transferred blood from one of these monkeys to humans and then spread from travel.  So many social and cultural factors contributed to the epidemic of HIV. The US politicians were indifferent to this growing epidemic as they believed only gays and drugs users were the ones infected so only the sinful people would die and that was ok to them. The attitudes towards the victims of the disease and of just the disease was horrid.  Everyone was afraid to get it as their fate would be death, the victims were scared of rejection by families and communities as only the sinful people obtained this cursed disease.  The people would lose their support system, their job as they were heavily weakened by it, and friends.  These people became socially unacceptable.

There were so many factors that enhanced the ability of HIV to sustain transmission in humans.  This disease could go undetected for decades without showing symptoms causing mass spread of the disease.  There were shooting galleries to help with spreading infected blood with needle sharing and not cleaning the needles after use. Even blood transfusions and blood donating was causing mass spread of the disease as anyone could donate, but they were donating the disease as well.  There were also bath houses were gay men had their activities and they didn’t use protection causing more spreading. The factor that helped to limit the ability of HIV spreading further was education. Education that HIV was transmitted sexually and through blood not but regular contact.  This caused for people to start spreading awareness about using condoms so you wouldn’t contract the disease and to not share needles/use a new one each time.  Education was the biggest factor because once people weren’t afraid they began to help and solve the issue of many Americans dying from this disease.

The overall effects and impacts of the HIV epidemic on US society was huge.  Death was common for many of the people with the disease and the fear was spread wide from it. This impact led to people looking for the government to get involved and help to find a cure or treatment. Progress has been made in the US as people are now educated and know how HIV is spread and do not discriminate people if they have it. They had created a 3 drug concoction that would help to slow down the effects of aids and let you live a healthy life as you did before you had the disease. They also have testing, ART, PrEP, and PEP to help diagnose patients.  HIV is still very relevant today. In Mississippi, the people there are still very discriminate to HIV patients and many of the males there have it. The patients are disowned and very ill.  In towns this small, everyone knows everyone so they try to keep being gay and sick a secret but it harms them. The people of this small town don’t feel comfortable getting the help they need and have a hard time getting the supplies to live the long life they should have. Miami is the epicenter in the US of HIV. Most of their infections here progress into AIDS as many don’t complete their medicine.  Many people today still do not know that they have the disease which spreads it further. Even though there is testing and free health care they do not have transportation, family support, poverty stricken, and plain just don’t follow up.  Everyone thinks it is ok now that the disease has been diagnosed but it is not being contained and is continually being spread.  There should be no excuse for the people with HIV as medicine is provided to them so no one else gets sick.  They need to do their job in order to erase this disease.

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