Blog4
After seeing the news this week I thought the reading this week were fitting. The text book advised that when someone has HIV or AIDS some people do not want to have any type of contact with them. They are often shunned by friends and even family. After reading this I could not help think about the time I first heard of AIDS. In recent news Sir Elton John has been the center of attention due to him having his first child and being treated like a “second class citizen” while in the United States. While watching the news I thought back about how Elton John first became the face of HIV and AIDS. Even though he does not have the disease he leaped into the spotlight when a hemophiliac teenager named Ryan White who contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion, was banned from his Kokomo, Indiana middle school in 1985. Elton John not only became a close friend of the young man but the two of them pressed for change about how individuals with AIDS were being treated by society. They also advocated for change and were instrumental in congress passing the Ryan White Care Act, which now provides more than $2 billion each year for AIDS medicine and treatment. In April it will be 21 years ago that Ryan White died of AIDS but I still remember it like it was yesterday. Last year Elton John wrote a letter to Ryan White, 20 years after his death from Aids. After reading the letter it made me realize that even though we still have a long way to go in how society treats individuals with AIDS, we have come a long way since Ryan White’s day.
Elton John’s Letter (A must read)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/22/AR2010042203658.html