AIDS a "Growing Global Disaster"

From the New York Times:

HIV/AIDS infection rates are growing among intravenous drug users, prostitutes and gay men around the globe but they are often viewed as outcasts and refused treatment, according to a report issued on Thursday.

The report, from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, also called on governments and humanitarian agencies to pay more attention to AIDS in their response to natural disasters and armed conflicts.

"HIV is a long-term and complex disaster on many levels ... For marginalized groups across the world -- injecting drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men -- rates are on the increase," said the Geneva-based humanitarian agency.

Those groups, living on the fringes of society in many countries and especially in the developing world, "often face stigma, criminalization and little, if any, access to prevention and treatment services," it added.

The 248-page study, an annual World Disasters Report, gave no new figures for AIDS sufferers but cited United Nations statistics that 2.1 million died from the disease last year.

Folks, this is a serious and avoidable problem. It is almost unforgivable that people on the margins are shunned and denied services that could help them.

Anyone who has even casually read the New Testament Gospels knows that most of Jesus' personal ministry on Earth was focused on just these type of people; lepers, prostitutes, the poor and destitute.

Those who deny health services to these people are acting in clear violation of the example of Jesus and the will of God--in other words, the ultimate definition of sin.

Isn't it interesting that those discriminating against those perceived as "sinners" are, in fact, sinning by doing so. Just one of the many paradoxes of true Christian faith.

Click here to read the rest of the New York Times article.