The way in which the Netherlands has responded to AIDS is arguably regarded as well organized and effective. This is possibly due to the timely and effective response to the threat of the disease, with a prevention programme starting in 1982. This book uses the Dutch example to provide an instructive case study for other countries with relevance for policy makers now and in the future. It documents and discusses the Dutch prevention policy, most specifically the prevention policies and activities for various target groups. It examines prevention research and studies on sexuality and health behaviour with the emphasis on individual responsibility.

Since nearly the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, activists have signaled the inadequacy of prevention strategies and drug protocols that have been developed from research done primarily on men. The latest C.D.C. figures prove they were right; for the first time since the beginning of the epidemic, AIDS cases among white men have fallen, yet the largest increases are among women.
Weaving together theoretical, critical, and practical perspectives, "Gendered Epidemic" is a collection of essays that questions the "add women and stir" model that governs most HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment efforts. The individual essays describe conflicts and contradictions, and pose new theories and practices. Written by HIV positive women, theorists, teachers, artists, policy makers and activists, it offers insights necessary to stem the spread of HIV.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of behavioral interventions to prevent HIV-AIDS risk-related behaviors. It synthesizes the empirical literature on individual, group, and community-level interventions and provides an objective and detailed assessment of intervention outcomes. Factors associated with behavioral risk for HIV transmission, theories of HIV risk behavior change, and the state of HIV prevention technology transfer are also reviewed. Additionally, behavioral interventions for adolescents and adults of diverse ethnic and sexual backgrounds are discussed with respect to each intervention type. Although the focus is on sexual risk reduction, interventions for sexual behavior of substance abusing populations are also covered.

Since nearly the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, activists have signaled the inadequacy of prevention strategies and drug protocols that have been developed from research done primarily on men. The latest C.D.C. figures prove they were right; for the first time since the beginning of the epidemic, AIDS cases among white men have fallen, yet the largest increases are among women.
Weaving together theoretical, critical, and practical perspectives, "Gendered Epidemic" is a collection of essays that questions the "add women and stir" model that governs most HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment efforts. The individual essays describe conflicts and contradictions, and pose new theories and practices. Written by HIV positive women, theorists, teachers, artists, policy makers and activists, it offers insights necessary to stem the spread of HIV.

Lack of proper nutrition can severely impact the immune system, especially when it is already compromised. This book defines recent advances in understanding the nutritional deficiencies found in AIDS and HIV-positive patients. It explores the scientific knowledge of how nutritional and dietary changes and herbal medicines can benefit or potentially harm these patients. The text also discusses the negative effects of undernutrition that can lead to starvation, a potent immunosuppressant. Nutrients and Foods in AIDS is a much-needed scientific appraisal of current alternative strategies used in preventing or treating AIDS and its symptoms for improved quality of life.

Meddling with Mythology examines the role of research in the construction of modern mythology or folklore surrounding HIV/AIDS.
Researchers from a variety of disciplines reflect on the insights gained and the impact of their work, in light of the initial panic surrounding the prediction of an AIDS epidemic.
Issues discussed include: -
* power
* representation
* the politics of text
* understanding research relationships
* impact of research on researchers and responders
* potential for change.
Meddling with Mythology takes the reader from the theoretical to the practicable and from the public to the personal in the representations of AIDS. The issues raised here also have great significance for those concerned with the social construction of knowledge, theory building and the research process more generally.

Robert Ariss - activist and academic - had a unique vision of HIV/AIDS. As an HIV seropositive individual for many years before his death on May 9, 1994, he was a full participant in, and critic of, the development of the gay community's response to the HIV epidemic both in Australia and internationally. Though Ariss' life is a definite presence in this study, Against Death: The Practice of Living with AIDS is not an autobiography. Instead, it is a unique and critical account of a public health crisis, a community's response, and the politics of sexuality. It was in Sydney, Australia, world-famous for its Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, that Robert Ariss lived and worked. It is his vision of that community - of its members infected with and affected by HIV - which is documented in this remarkable anthropological study. Yet the study's implications reach beyond Sydney to all communities living with HIV and AIDS.

Nancy Stoller records how the poor, people of color, gay men and lesbians, drug users, and women have built social movements to fight the impact of AIDS, revealing that organizational structure and culture have a greater impact on who is served and how than do public health theories or official organizational goals. She draws on ethnographic research and the words of the activists themselves, as well as the literature of social movements and theories of bureaucracy. In addition to the stories of the organizational strategies, the book offers guidelines for dealing with diversity and conflict with both theoretical and practical perspectives on cross-community and international organizing.

Nancy Stoller records how the poor, people of colour, gay men and lesbians, drug users, and women have built social movements to fight the impact of AIDS. This study reveals that organizational structure and culture have a greater impact on who is served and how, than public health theories or official organizational goals. Nancy Stoller draws on ethnographic research and the words of the activists themselves, as well as the literature of social movements and theories of bureaucracy. In addition to accounts of organizational strategies, the book offers guidelines for dealing with diversity and conflict with both theoretical and practical perspectives on cross-community and international organizing.

Based on a conference on Oxidative Stress and Redox Regulation, held at the Pasteur Institute, Paris, this work examines fundamental, chemical, biological and medical studies of free radicals on different targets and the consequences of their reactivity. It covers the chemistry and biochemistry of free radicals, free radicals as second messengers that group the activation of transcription factors and enzymes, the importance of the antioxidant system in cell metabolism regulation, and the role of free radicals and antioxidants in disease management. The editors of this work are three of the most respected pioneers in the field. Dr. Montagnier is credited as the discoverer of HIV.

With research based on focus groups and individual interviews in the United States, as well as a thorough and integrative review of the current literature, Latino Gay Men and HIV discusses the six main sociocultural factors in Latino communities - machismo, homophobia, family cohesion, sexual silence, poverty and racism - which undermine safe sex practices. In an attempt to explain the alarmingly high incidence of unprotected intercourse in this population, this in-depth cultural and psychological analysis shows how an apparent incongruence between knowledge or intention and behaviour can possess its own sociocultural logic and meaning.

From the start of the HIV epidemic, the psychological and social aspects of the AIDS infection have been recognized. What could have been regarded simply as an infectious disease was soon acknowledged as a global problem that raised important issues about its transmission and prevention: economic, ethical and legal questions regarding the mental health consequences and the need for access to medical and social care. This volume contains a selection of key contributions to the discussion on the psychological and social implications of HIV infection. It contains authoritative papers by senior practitioners and researchers in the field of the psychological and social aspects of HIV infection. The book should appeal to those involved in providing care for people with HIV infection as well as those involved in preventing the spread of the HIV infection.

In this enlightening book, you ll explore the life struggles and adaptations leading up to and following HIV infection in young Americans. The cases presented in Youths Living with HIV envisage a variety of experiences of youths living with HIV and AIDS, including individuals of different races, of each gender, and of different sexual preferences. This discussion of the private "troubles" and experiences of youths helps you understand and identify dependent and larger public issues surrounding HIV infection and AIDS, and demonstrates the need for comprehensive and targeted intervention and preventive measures.This book is the result of the first federally funded multi-site study to research, develop, and provide HIV education and prevention specifically to young Americans. Detailed narrative descriptions were collected by ethnographers of the Joven Project, which started in October 1992, and explored and documented the lives of youths living with HIV and AIDS over a two-year period. This ethnographic exploratory study was one component of a larger National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) supported Secondary AIDS Education and Prevention Program. Youths Living with HIV reconstructs the past and present struggles that young people living with HIV and AIDS face(d), employing qualitative field interviews. Larger and interrelated developmental, social, cultural, and political factors are also illustrated and discussed. As you read through the chapters, you ll gain insight into: youth development--coming of age, sexual development, and risk-taking behaviors gay development and activity--coming out, establishing relationships, and power-imbalanced/cross-generational relationships self-harmful behaviors--drug use, sex, and poverty notification and reaction to infection impression management and disclosure of infection status adaptation to HIV status and necessary life changes sexual activity and relationships after infection social worlds and support networks/pathological or destructive networks availability and success of existing AIDS-related services future orientation and life expectations Whether you re a counselor, teacher, policymaker, physician, mental health professional, social worker, or advocate who specializes in or focus on youth development, gay youths, field methodology (qualitative research), public health, women s health, drug use, sex work, and/or AIDS, you will find Youths Living with HIV essential to understanding and helping this affected population.

Historically, AIDS is just one of a series of dreaded diseases that have aroused both great fear and irrational actions. The previous diseases, including bubonic plague, syphilis, tuberculosis, leprosy and cancer, have evoked such a sense of dread that rational moves to halt the disease have become compromised.; This text examines the deep sense of fear that AIDS evokes, stigmatizing those who suffer from the disease, as well as their families and caregivers. Until AIDS can be seen for what it actually is - a life-threatening disease - policies providing for humane treatment will not evolve. The book also emphasizes that diseases are more than biological phenomena or individual catastrophes - they are profoundly social events. The ways in which diseases are spread and treated are strongly influenced by larger sociological considerations, and they may have the capacity to change social institutions or society Itself. Rooting Aids In The History Of Diseases, The First Part Of The book reviews the nature, history and responses of earlier dreaded diseases. The next section examines AIDS itself, proposed as the archetypal dreaded disease. Already creating a sense of panic, AIDS is also shown to be a social disease, likely to have significant effects on the social order. Thus, only by containing the epidemic of fear and controlling the resulting irrationality, can the AIDS epidemic be halted.

From the start of the AIDS epidemic there have been calls for greater solidarity between affected groups and communities, and public health services. This can be seen both in the move towards healthy alliances in health service work, and in the demands of AIDS activists worldwide. This text brings together specially selected papers addressing these and related themes given at the Eighth Conference on Social Aspects of AIDS held in London in late 1995. Among the issues examined are profession and policy; the heightened vulnerability of groups such as women and younger gay men; and issues of drug use, disability and HIV prevention.

From the start of the AIDS epidemic there have been calls for greater solidarity between affected groups and communities, and public health services. This can be seen both in the move towards healthy alliances in health service work, and in the demands of AIDS activists worldwide. This text brings together specially selected papers addressing these and related themes given at the Eighth Conference on Social Aspects of AIDS held in London in late 1995. Among the issues examined are profession and policy; the heightened vulnerability of groups such as women and younger gay men; and issues of drug use, disability and HIV prevention.

How sexual risk is negotiated betwen partners is an area of considerable theoretical interest, with the dominant models of analysis focusing on individual decisions to engage in sexual behaviour and relying on "rational" decision-making. This work, based on the findings from work co-ordinated by the Centre d'Etudes Sociologiques in Brussels, offers a social critique of the theories and perspectives which have currently been brought to bear in the study of sexual risk behaviour and HIV. Leading European researchers offers a conceptual framework for analysis based on sexual interactions and their social context. The practical relevance of new perspectives on sexual behaviour in the context of HIV/AIDS prevention is also discussed.

How sexual risk is negotiated betwen partners is an area of considerable theoretical interest, with the dominant models of analysis focusing on individual decisions to engage in sexual behaviour and relying on "rational" decision-making. This work, based on the findings from work co-ordinated by the Centre d'Etudes Sociologiques in Brussels, offers a social critique of the theories and perspectives which have currently been brought to bear in the study of sexual risk behaviour and HIV. Leading European researchers offers a conceptual framework for analysis based on sexual interactions and their social context. The practical relevance of new perspectives on sexual behaviour in the context of HIV/AIDS prevention is also discussed.

"Adelman and Frey take advantage of every opportunity to leave their audience with a splendid reading experience that will prompt one to think about community and communication in new and exciting ways. And as it should be, the reader also will not soon forget the echoes of the voices of the ordinary, but remarkable, men and women who inspired the work -- the residents who live and have lived in the fragile community at BH". -- Journal of Health Communication

This book examines the concept of "community", focusing on how communication practices help manage the tensions of creating and sustaining everyday communal life amidst the crisis of human loss. While acknowledging how the contradictory and inconsistent nature of human relationships inevitably affects community, this intimate and compelling text shows how community is created and sustained in concrete communication practices.

The authors explore these ideas at Bonaventure House, an award-winning residential facility for people with AIDS, where the web of social relationships and the demands of a life-threatening illness intersect in complex ways. Facing a life-threatening illness can defy meaningful social connections, but it can also inspire such ties, sometimes in ways that elude us in the course of daily life. By understanding how collective communication practices help residents forge a sense of community out of the fragility and chaos f living together with AIDS, we are able to better understand how communication is inexorably intertwined with the formation of community in other environments.

Based on seven years of ethnographic research including participant-observation, in-depth interviews, and questionnaires, thisbook weaves together narratives and visual images with conceptual analysis to uncover the ongoing oppositional forces of community life, and to show how both mundane and profound communication processes ameliorate these tensions, and thereby sustain this fragile community. Because the average length of stay for a resident is seven months -- in which time he or she moves from being a newcomer to a community member to someone the community remembers -- the text reflects this short, but crystallized life, starting with the day a new resident opens the door to the day he or she passes away.

The writing is very rich -- intimate, engaging, personal, compelling, and vivid. The stories told discuss such deeply personal topics as the dilemmas of romantic relationships in a context fraught with many perils; issues of power, authority, and control that enable and constrain social life; and communicative practices that help residents cope with bereavement over the loss of others as well as their own impending deaths. The text concludes by examining the lessons learned from Bonaventure House about creating and sustaining a health community, and serves as an inspiration for strengthening interpersonal relationships and communities in other environments.

Series Information:
Social Aspects of AIDS

What has been the impact of AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases on the lives of young people? Youth, AIDS and Sexual Health provides a comprehensive overview of research and policy in this increasingly important area.
The book describes the world-wide incidence and prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases among adolescents and examines how their sexual behaviour has changed as a result of the threat of AIDS. It also looks at young people's knowledge and attitudes about their own sexual health, as well as the usefulness of models of predicting those at risk. The authors also dicuss the effectiveness of institutional policies in educating young people and in preventing sexually transmitted diseases.
Drawing from the author's insights from their research programmes, Youth, AIDS and Sexual Health will be of considerable benefit to health care providers, sex educators and all those who work with and study adolescents.

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"AIDS, Drugs and Prevention" brings together a range of international contributions on the research, theory and practice of developing community-based HIV prevention. Its aims to understand how individual actions to prevent HIV transmission are constrained and encouraged by situational and social context. Drawing on ethnographic and epidemiological research among populations of drug users, sex workers and gay men, it explores how future HIV prevention interventions can target changes at the level of the individual as well as at the level of the community and wider social environment.
Essays are presented from an international group of contributors, including fifteen US scholars: Robert S. Broadhead, Richard Curtis, Don C. Des Jarlais, Samuel R. Friedman, Jean-Paul C. Grund, Douglas D. Heckathorn, Benny Jose, Steven K. Koester, Alan Neaigus, Cindy Patton, Bruce Stepherson, L. Synn Stern, Meryl Sufian, John K. Watters and Wayne Wiebel. "AIDS, Drugs and Prevention" considers the diverse practices of community-based responses to HIV prevention in theoretical contexts and addresses the problems of professional practice. It will be invaluable reading for lecturers, researchers and practitioners in health promotion, health policy, social work and medical sociology.

AIDS, Drugs and Prevention brings together a range of international contributions on the research, theory and practice of developing community-based HIV prevention. It aims to understand how individual actions to prevent HIV transmission are constrained and encouraged by situational and social context. Drawing on ethnographic and epidemiological research among populations of drug users, sex workers and gay men, it explores how future HIV prevention interventions can target changes at the level of the individual as well as at the level of the community and wider social environment.
AIDS, Drugs and Prevention offers practical and theoretical insights into community-based health work in the time of AIDS. It provides invaluable reading for students, lecturers, researchers and practioners in health promotion, health policy, social work and medical sociology.

This study draws on feminist theory, cultural studies, the philosophy of science, and gay and lesbian studies to problematize the factual scientific discourse about AIDS, and interpret it as a political discourse. Waldby argues that much AIDS discourse relies on an implicit and unconscious equation between sexual health and heterosexual masculinity. In this equation, women, bisexual and gay men are the targets of preventative programmes, while heterosexual men tend to remain unaddressed by such programmes. Drawing upon examples of preventative policies from Australia, Britain and the USA, Waldby investigates the concept of public health and questions whose interests are represented in a "healthy society". It demonstrates the extent to which established ideas about the virus: the immune system, the HIV test and the epidemiology of the disease, rely upon unexamined, conservative assumptions about sexual identity and sexual difference.

Since early-on in the epidemic, there has been much interest in the role that bisexual behaviour among men may play in HIV transmission. This text reviews from an international perspective what has been learned about male bisexuality in countries as diverse as Peru and Britain. Its authors examine the forms that bisexuality takes in different cultures, what it means to the men concerned, and whether or not such behaviour poses special risks. The implications of such enquiry for HIV prevention efforts are also examined.