Why do so many Africans have AIDS?

[Ned]

Originally posted by paiktis22
Allegendly Aids derives from a certain species of monkies.
A theory which requires a rather disgusting intercourse having taken place to have the virus passed on to the human species.


That's why I prefer the "escaped from the lab" approach. It offers ease of mind.

They eat monkeys in Africa.

[The Mad Monk]

How the hell do you "weaponize" something with a ten year incubation period? Sounds like an urban legend to me.

[Buck Birdseed]

Originally posted by Ned
They eat monkeys in Africa.

Strange, the only people I've ever seen eat strange meats like Crocodile and Hippo in Africa were stupid westerners at Nairobi restaurant Carnivore.

Who exactly would "they" be? Staple meat in most of africa would be beef, goat or chicken, in five and a half years I never saw anything else served in a local restaurant (tourist hotels with practically obligatory Buffalo Steak excepted) or at the house of a local person, except one time when we visited a Big Game Hunting enthusiast and had some lovely Kudu.

[Carver]

Originally posted by The Mad Monk
How the hell do you "weaponize" something with a ten year incubation period? Sounds like an urban legend to me.

It's in the TRC Final Report; and the incubation period is usually less than ten years.

[DuncanK]

When I was in the Navy and visited the Phillipine Islands I thought they really did eat monkey meat. I inocently went up to a sidewalk vender and said, "5 monkey meats on a stick please." I learned some cuss words in their language that day.

I forgot the cuss words so don't ask.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Buck Birdseed
Strange, the only people I've ever seen eat strange meats like Crocodile and Hippo in Africa were stupid westerners at Nairobi restaurant Carnivore.

It's called bush meat, and lumber, oil, contruction workers, etc. will pay poachers to provide meat for them. This is the main reason why much of Africa's wild fauna is on the decline.

Bloom is spot on about the break down of the African societies contributing to the spread of the disease. This in itself has numerous causes from colonialism to civil war to intigration into the world market. Combined with the traditional subordination of women, it was a recipe for the spread of STDs, this one just happens to kill.

[cavebear]

There *are* hunter/gather groups in Africa, South America, and Southeastern Asia that capture monkeys for food. I'm not saying that is necessarily how the virus jumped species to humans, just pointing out that killing monkeys for food is well-documented in some specific and limited situations.

[David Floyd]

Look, this should not be a question at all. The people in Africa are 100% responsible for the spread of AIDs. That's right, 100%. If they didn't have promiscuous, unprotected sex with multiple partners, AIDs would not be nearly the problem it is.

You can blame the Catholis for not allowing the use of condoms, but again, it comes down to personal responsibility. If your religion is causing you to engage in actions that spread a horrible disease, then just maybe your religion is wrong. This should be common sense.

Again, personal responsibility should be emphasized, not "cultural factors" - that sounds like bull**** to me.

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
AIDS has probably been around for centuries, but while it was just the occasional Joe Schmoe in the jungle dying, who cared?

When the Kinshasa Highway opened, prostitution started thriving right the way along it. It was an STD super-highway and it brought HIV into more promiscuous cultures, where it spread like wildfire.

No, it appears to be a relatively new transferred virus to the human population, sometime around the middle of the past century. The virulence of the disease and the absence of any population showing inhereted resistence suggests a recent development.

[cavebear]

Originally posted by David Floyd
Look, this should not be a question at all. The people in Africa are 100% responsible for the spread of AIDs. That's right, 100%. If they didn't have promiscuous, unprotected sex with multiple partners, AIDs would not be nearly the problem it is.

You can blame the Catholis for not allowing the use of condoms, but again, it comes down to personal responsibility. If your religion is causing you to engage in actions that spread a horrible disease, then just maybe your religion is wrong. This should be common sense.

Again, personal responsibility should be emphasized, not "cultural factors" - that sounds like bull**** to me.

And no one in the rest of the world has "promiscuous, unprotected sex with multiple partners"? Please...

AIDS is not the only rampant sexually-transmitted disease. Besides, how do you think AIDS was transmitted to the rest of the world? By donated blood from African hunter/gatherers? How did it spread among homosexuals and heterosexuals? Did you know that in some places heterosexual transimission is the primary cause of the spread of AIDS? And not just in Africa.

And consider that, with a disease that can take years to manifest itself symptomatically (but can be transmitted before that), how would one know they must take special precautions?

[Dis]

I don't think we should question why it happened, but what is being done about it.

[Lancer]

Why?

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by David Floyd
If they didn't have promiscuous, unprotected sex with multiple partners, AIDs would not be nearly the problem it is.

You say that as if it's a personal moral failing to have promiscuouss, unprotected sex. Today we know that it is reckless and dangerous behavior, but during the period in which the virus spread across Africa and across the world the biggest disease we had to fear was herpes. It only becomes a moral failing after you've been informed how the disease spreads, and it was already widespread across Africa and the world by that point.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Caligastia
Culture is part of the answer. In many parts of Africa it's considered "unmanly" to use a condom.

In many parts of Africa they can't even afford to buy condoms. If there's even any available.

[Willem]

Originally posted by paiktis22
Allegendly Aids derives from a certain species of monkies.
A theory which requires a rather disgusting intercourse having taken place to have the virus passed on to the human species.


That's why I prefer the "escaped from the lab" approach. It offers ease of mind.

You don't need sex to transmit it. It's quite possible that someone simply ate an infected monkey that wasn't cooked, or even drank the blood.