AIDS Epidemic: A Phenomenological Analysis of the Infectious Body (From The Meaning of AIDS: Implications for Medical Science, Clinical Practice, and Public Health Policy, P 50-60, 1989, Eric T Juengst and Barbara A Koenig, eds. -- NCJ-123590)

• NCJ Number: 123596
• Author(s): J S Murphy
• Date Published: 1989
• Length: 11 pages
• Sale Source: Praeger Publishers
• Publication Type: Research (Theoretical)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

A phenomenological analysis of the public's panic response to AIDS shows the influence of pre-existing attitudes toward contagious disease within our cultural stock of knowledge.

Abstract

Such analysis identifies two general responses to the biological and social threats of AIDS: a panic arising from fear of death and the body-out-of-control as well as an existential revolt against the social oppression of having AIDS. The former response leads to irrational consequences that may jeopardize the rights of persons with or at high risk for AIDS, specifically the rights to freedom, adequate health care, and social possibilities. The latter response offers to maintain our essential freedom and emphasizes our interconnections with each other as members of a social body in which the value of each of us is linked to the values all of us create. It thus encourages sound social policy on AIDS issues. Such a philosophy of revolt against AIDS can define and evaluate the dilemmas of choice and risk inherent not only in epidemics of contagious disease, such as AIDS, but in the health of social life generally. 29 notes.