Today in one of my classes a professor was lecturing about why HIV/AIDS is a "supposed" epidemic in many parts of Africa.

I'm copying/pasting directly from: http://data.unaids.org/pub/Fac.....hiv_en.pdf

"HIV is staged on the basis of certain signs, symptoms, infections, and cancers grouped by the World Health Organization (WHO):

Primary HIV infection - may be asymptomatic or experienced as Acute retroviral syndrome

Clinical stage 1 - asymptomatic or generalized swelling of the lymph nodes

Clinical stage 2 - includes minor weight loss, minor mucocutaneous manifestations, and recurrent upper respiratory tract infections

Clinical stage 3 - includes unexplained chronic diarrhoea, unexplained persistent fever, oral candidiasis or leukoplakia, severe bacterial infections, pulmonary tuberculosis, and acute necrotizing inflammation in the mouth.
Some persons with clinical stage 3 have AIDS.

Clinical stage 4 - includes 22 opportunistic infections or cancers related to HIV.
All persons with clinical stage 4 have AIDS."

It is interesting to consider that many of the symptoms that are used to diagnose a person with AIDS in Africa are prevalent in many other parts of the developing world, but yet in those other places the symptoms aren't linked with AIDS. Swollen lymph nodes, weight loss and fever could be attributed to poor diet, hygiene, no access to clean water etc. Respiratory infections can come about as a result of people having to cook and heat their homes with biomass and breathe in a dangerous amount of particulates daily as a result. I'm still looking, but I am having a hard time finding out what percentage of people diagnosed with AIDS in Africa actually had blood tests done and what percentage were diagnosed based on the list of symptoms above.

I'm not trying to imply that AIDS is a made up problem, I just had never considered what went into classifying and diagnosing people with AIDS in developing parts of the world.

John Paul the First, once revealed in a public audience in 1978:

“. . . this morning, I flushed my toilet with a solid gold lever edged with diamonds and at this very moment, bishops and cardinals are using a bathroom on the second floor of the papal palace which trappings, I am told, would draw more than fifty million dollars at auction . . . Believe me, one day, we who live in opulence, while so many are dying because they have nothing, will have to answer to Jesus as to why we have not carried out His instruction, ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself.’ We, the clergy of the Church together with our congregations, who substitute gold and pomp and ceremony in place of Christ’s instruction, who judge our masquerade of singing His praises to be more precious than human life, will have the most to explain.”

The Pope should look inward to his own church before criticizing others.

You seem to have a chip on your shoulder concerning catholicism, cord. maybe that's best left to a shrink and not mindless vitriolic babbling on what's supposed to be a celeb gossip site. Just sayin'

Red isn't her color!

You dont need a shrink to suspect that religion is the root of all evil.