NCJ Number
118991
Journal
Daedalus Volume: 118 Issue: 2 Dated: (Spring 1989) Pages: 113-134
Date Published
1989
Length
22 pages
Annotation
Unlike other international health problems, AIDS strikes the developing and developed world with equal vengeance and forces all nations to consider their common interests in the solution of international health problems.
Abstract
According to the World Health Organization estimates, based on cumulative reports from 133 countries through February of 1988, the world has had 150,000 cases of AIDS and between 5 million and 10 million people are presently infected with HIV. Health, monetary, and social issues regarding AIDS are present in all nations but differ in each nation according to cultural, political, and medical features. Obstacles to international cooperation in the confrontation of AIDS are grouped into five categories: practical issues, diverging national interests, lack of consensus on the nature of the problem, mutual mistrust among nations, and cultural dissonance. AIDS demonstrates the increasing interdependence between nations in the area of health, as the more it is recognized, the easier it will be to establish proper institutional and conceptual bases for addressing the international interests in its control. 47 notes.