Paper 2 Health Pamphlet Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Paper 2 Health Pamphlet - Essay Example AIDS has no definite cure and the world community has only been able to reduce its spread and/or reducing its effect rate on a victim already infected. For this reason, HIV/AIDS has been described as a worldwide disaster. According to National Institute of Health (NIH) (2011), as an example, more than one million US citizens live with HIV/AIDS so far. Worse still, AIDS is one of the leading killer diseases of the world (NIH, 2011). Since the disease can be controlled both medically and morally, it becomes important to let different societies know of its nature. HIV/AIDS symptoms AIDS is more of a health condition than a disease – it only destroys the immune system – and it is difficult to tell recently infected people from healthy ones. However, victims start progressively becoming weak as time goes by (NIH, 2011). Similarly, the victim’s body becomes vulnerable to most human diseases. Sooner, the victim starts getting various illnesses that do not heal easily du e to the weakened immune system. As the disease advances, each illness is manifested by distinct symptoms. In general, according to NIH (2011), early likely symptoms (2-3 months after infection) include headache, fever, tiredness and enlargement of lymph nodes around the neck and groin areas while later symptoms (4 months and more) include: speedy weight loss; constant fever; constant tiredness; prolonged and pronounced lymph glands swellings in neck, armpits and groin; constant diarrhea; sores around anus, genitals and mouth; pneumonia; blotches around major orifices; loss of memory; stress; and depression among various other neurologic disorders. Risk factors The HIV virus is found in four kinds of body fluids: semen, blood, vaginal fluid and breast milk. Activities that lead to direct contact with these fluids are the risk factors. They include but not limited to: engaging sex with multiple partners or with strangers without protection; recklessly sharing of intravenous injection equipment; having other sexually transmitted infections (for example, genital herpes, gonorrhea and syphilis among others); having illnesses such as tuberculosis and hepatitis; prostitution; and unknowingly passing HIV from mother to fetus, during birth or during breastfeeding. It is important to note that HIV virus cannot survive for too long outside the body (it is a parasite in living body cells only) and that any other activity that does not result in direct contact with infected body fluids named above cannot lead to infection at all (NIH, 2011). Quality of life Often, AIDS is mistakenly taken as a bad omen in many societies. HIV victims tend to give up their dignity and thus they mostly suffer from depression, have low self esteem, and, of course, their health condition deteriorates. This leads to poor quality of life at personal level and low life expectancy in general. However, although AIDS is an incurable condition, there are several mechanisms that are used today to redu ce AIDS effects so as to lengthen life of the victims and/or to stop the HIV spreading. These include: advising victims and their caregivers on the right diet; health education for the public awareness; use of medication such as antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) (ARVs suppress the number and activity of HIV viruses in the body); and social motivation. With proper

Latin American Cinema (cuban, Strawberry and Chocolate) Essay

Latin American Cinema (cuban, Strawberry and Chocolate) - Essay Example Describing those days, the film under discussion qualifies as a Cuban cinema with certain typical traits. Mr. Gutierrez Alea, the maker of this film, has always been sensitive towards â€Å"Cubanness†. This Cubanness finds expression through a social commitment, which must also culminate at a social resonance. People must be able to identify themselves with the characters of the film, and further reflect on the subject and predicate of the presentation. Memories of Underdevelopment effectively portrayed the identity factor of the Cuban society and thus it accomplishes as a typical Cuban film. Mr. Gutierrez Alea was critical to the revolution but not destructive towards it. Hence, Memories of Underdevelopment can be defined as a portrait of the Cuban society created by a critical insider of the Cuban Revolution itself. The film covers the humanistic aspects of the revolutionary outlook through the heart and mind of a sensitive filmmaker. Hence, it becomes a descriptive monologue of the Cuban Revolution as a whole. The film has a radical expressionist approach towards the Cuban Revolution and the society. It particularly seeks to point out the stringency and confusion in the post revolutionary Cuba during the 1960s. The film is about an intellectual who strives to find out his place in the post-revolutionary social framework of Cuba. Thus, the director enters a world of inter-contradiction, where we find both revolutionary commitment and humanly hesitations in one go. In the process, the critique becomes pretty innovative. The film does not attack one’s humanly weaknesses. Rather, it portrays this factor of weakness sympathetically. The assertive masterpiece is meshed into the picturing of this sensitive feature of the human mind. The weakness or hesitation actually develops from the internal mind, where subconscious reasoning often takes control of a man’s