HIV: How Science Shaped the Ethics |
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Authors: | Gayle E. Woloschak |
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Affiliation: | Northwestern University;  |
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Abstract: | AIDS is a debilitating and fatal disease that was first identified as an infectious disease syndrome in the 1970s. The discovery of a nearly universally fatal infectious and rapidly spreading disease in the post–antibiotics era created apprehension in the medical community and alarm in the general population. Questions about how patients should be handled in medical and nonmedical settings resulted in the ostracizing of many AIDS patients and inappropriate patient management. Scientific investigation into modes of disease transmission and control helped to shape the management of AIDS patient care in such a way that ethical and protective practices could be developed. In this article I discuss some of the ethical questions that were addressed by appropriate scientific inquiry. |
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Keywords: | Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) AIDS and ethics AIDS and scientific inquiry ethics and decisionmaking in AIDS patients Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) |
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