Will we help them?

Hello fellow bloggers,
It’s been a busy week! Can’t wait till Friday :)

I want to say that this week’s QOTW got me thinking real hard on how I will react if I was needed to help a bleeding HIV patient. I must say it was tough to actually imagine being in that situation. However, I know that I will not hesitate giving someone a helping hand just because I am afraid of contracting a disease. After I posted my answer, I thought about asking someone close to me this question, and put them in the same situation. So, I asked my sister what she will do, and I was shocked to hear her response. This is exactly what she said: “Noor, no one can care for another more than caring for themselves. I will not touch the 23-years old lady, I will drive home and call for help, but I will not actually risk my own safety”!!!!

It was horrible to hear that, and I tried so hard to argue with her about it, but it wasn’t working… When I gave it more thought, I realized that my sister is not the only one who’s “Terrified” of being near someone with HIV. There are a lot of people out there who know so little and fear so much. And it’s worse because we can’t stop them from thinking that, we can only watch HIV patients being discriminated against, even when they need help, people will still not help them. Ahhhhhhhhhh!

Anyway, I am starting to get worried about assignment 4 because I have two more movies to watch and I feel like I’m running out of time. Last Friday, I dragged my friend with me to the library and we watched the Silver Lake Life movie. Oh man, she cried her eyes out when one of the guys died; you could hear her crying, IN THE LIBRARY!!! I felt so bad for the guy and seeing his lover taping him while he was being carried away, wow, it bring tears to my eyes as I’m typing. Life is so unfair!

DID YOU KNOW???
Just like every week, I was doing some research about stigma and HIV/AIDS when I found out information about how stigma affects women with HIV. According to the South African Medical Research Council, in Africa, women are looked at differently and they’re usually disadvantaged culturally and economically. They are not excused for their behavior that resulted in their infection while men are excused. Also, women are still thought to be the reason for all the sexually transmitted disease, and don’t receive the proper medical help HIV positive males recieve. A scary but realistic fact.

Reference: Visser, P. (2007). HIV/AIDS Stigma, South Africa Medical Research Council. retrieved October 07, 2009, from http://www.mrc.ac.za/public/facts17.htm