Sep 14, 2006 12:14:01 AM cite

As a citizen of the most powerful nation in the world, our responsibility is paramount. Corporations raise prices, and test drugs on poorer people because it's more efficient , and the masses themselves have very little choice. Until the "three ring circus" of industry, government, and corporation decides to grow up and become moral individuals, their will not be a solution to this problem anytime soon.

by Binauralcode

Sep 12, 2006 11:18:45 PM cite

generally:the level of our responsibility depends on our knowledge. in this case we should do what we can do. at last we would help us.

by kindcken

Sep 12, 2006 8:06:57 PM cite

When human beings are dying everyday, we have a great responsibility. Education is key to working with African governments to increase continent wide information. So much myth is surrounding AIDS in Africa that it contributes to the dying & infecting of others. How could we NOT feel a great responsibility? They are human beings.

by Deannahawk

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Antoschka - Ekaterina Moshaeva: First of all, the big civilisation creates this illness. And secondly, it is on our consciousness. We must help, but we must help not only with medicine, - of course it is very important to create a new medicine for this illness to safe lives, - but we should invest a lot of energy, money and love for propaganda to achieve a new way of living. AIDS is not only a illness of a body, but also it is illness of a soul. People who say “we are healthy, we do not have this illness”…It is such an ill question than I am confused what language I should speak. AIDS is spreading out, because in many African countries they have wars, rape women, people live in such appalling conditions , they are so ignorant, that they even do not know how dangerous it is. A lot of money, funds are needed for their education, to give them information how to avoid this illness, how not to get it. I would say, AIDS is the illness of conscience, because it is about a human being who should change and think over his ethical norms.

by Antoschka - Ekaterina Moshaeva

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Abbas Beydoun: I do not know... Of course companies take some of the responsibility, but it is not a matter of morality or principles, it is a social system which spreads the responsibilities on many parts in the society. Now we are talking about social system where not only the government is responsible, but also experts. A clear vision for the future should be planed and we should expect what will come after the current society.

by Abbas Beydoun

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Alvaro Restrepo: The whole world has a big responsibility. AIDS must be our absolut priority. Global health is perhaps one of the biggest tragedies nowadays, mainly AIDS, which is related to love and transmitted by sex, but we are going back to this point in the next question which has to do with education. A socity has to die if it doesn't educate its people and that's exactly what is happening in Africa. That's why I talk about an enormous responsibility. I think that concerning AIDS the Catholic Church has committed one of the biggest crimes of this century because it hasn't support the condom as a mean of AIDS prevention. We should strongly condemn that position fron all points of view. Condom is a well known prevention mean, that's why we can't call "Religion" to something that is opossed to it. I would call it a system of power, but not a religion. What this religion has made ist totaly criminal and it must be punished.

by Alvaro Restrepo

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Ana Lucy Bengochea:

by Ana Lucy Bengochea

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Andries Botha: Our responsibility is enormous. Our responsibility is to hold frailty, manage disease and encapsulate that as an essential part of being human. Our inability to do so, our inability to take cognizance of the implications of HIV and AIDS disease might manifest and went rampant in such a manner is a great tragedy. It’s one of our great, great, human tragedies of our time. Our inability to hold sufferings to recognize disease as an integral component and a constituent part of just being humans. We cannot say anymore. Our responsibility is enormous, absolutely enormous... and, it’s impossible for me to imagine how we could live in our world today. I don’t know how we can -- individual responsibility towards solving this problem is enormous.

by Andries Botha

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Angaangaq Lyberth: My dear Judith, the responsibility is so big that it cannot be filled to any space. It is true that each person is responsible for his or her own wellbeing. But when it has failed whole nations, the whole world then becomes responsible for it. How do we do that? I haven’t got a clue of how it is that we can do. I am grown up far away from what happened. But now that I have realized it does exist even amongst my own people in the far north on the top of the world it becomes the responsibility of mine as it is for you, Judith. How to do it and what to do? You know that they have found the ability to at least control the virus better so the people who have it can have a better life, or whatever is remaining of their life. But unfortunately the way we are doing it is really stopping the life of those people afflicted by it. And until you and I we speak about it openly and realize that you and I we have a responsibility to make sure that that disease is controlled—and not the disease but the lives of those who have it—then we have a long ways to go. We have a long ways to go. We keep saying that it is a bad thing but we also are being controlled by the economy of the pharmacist, of those who make the pills. They want to make their money on the ills of the world rather than let the world eliminating the ills through the ability we have developed. Judith, we have a long ways to go. Help me.

by Angaangaq Lyberth

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Anuradha Koirala: It is the biggest issue, if you think and personalize this issue as your own. Then, definitely, this is going to be most sensitive and important issue for the whole world because this is – you have to personalize the issue -- personalize the issue and take it as your own and then you will realize that this is very, very important. Automatically, it will be our responsibility.

by Anuradha Koirala

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Anuradha Mittal: I think it’s when I think about AIDS in Africa, I just don’t think about it as AIDS in Africa, I see in the global world as AIDS in humanity. It is a disease which is confronting each one of us. It is not just an issue for Africa; it is not just -- the deaths in Africa are not just a concern for the people of Africa but they are all our concern. So given that, I think our responsibility -- well just look at the budget for the war in Iraq, over $300 billion budget for this war in Iraq could basically fought AIDS initiative at least 30 times over or more for more than 10 years, 24 years. So, given that, it feels like that is how big our responsibility is. We do have the resources that we can ensure that people do not have to die of this disease. We know that there are now treatments and can work. But as long as we have things such as intellectual property rights which will keep generic medicines away from people, we are not just shirking responsibility, we are causing more deaths because of AIDS in Africa. So, our responsibility basically is to be challenging that people’s lives cannot be about just money, that when we have something like AIDS, we cannot talk about how pharmaceutical industry can make more profits. But this is time for us to take our responsibility seriously and say this is not just about a problem in Africa, it’s all our problem. And we as humanity need to demand that medicines be made available to people who need them, better budgets are made available to people who need them instead of going into military budgets or whatever.

by Anuradha Mittal

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Ashok Gangadean: What's interesting about this question is that whether we take an incredible tragedy such as AIDS in Africa, AIDS anywhere in the world, it’s symptomatic of a profound problem that may be seen as localized and not our problem, but in the culture of awakened people, where we see and discover a profound interconnectivity with one another and with nature. For example, the taking down of the rain forest is our concern or the melting ice cap through global warming is all of our concern. So, we are now living in a global age. We've always been in the global age if you listen to our great teachers in the sense that we are profoundly interconnected with each other with the planet and with all creation. So, in that culture of awakened connectivity, the problems of other people on this planet, all the problems, not only AIDS but endemic poverty and genocide, and the violence to women and children, and the ecological crisis we face wherever they are are our collective problems. So, we must take full responsibility when we become global citizens in this global consciousness. All of these issues that affect our neighbors and our different cultures are our problems, which is part of the moral consciousness, to tend to the other, as we tend to ourselves. So, self-care requires us to care for others. All of the different problems are our problems. This really comes from the global citizenship and the global responsibility that comes with that.

by Ashok Gangadean

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Audrey Kitagawa: Our responsibility with respect to this AIDS issue is huge because AIDS is not only Africa, AIDS is everywhere. And the consequence of this epidemic is going to be huge because it's going to have many implications with respect to the many orphan children, with respect to the death of people who hold positions as teachers, as parents, as police officers, in every sector of employment, and these people are also our brothers, our sisters, our mothers, our fathers, our children, our relatives, so they're all part of the human family that is suffering from a disease that is going to have far-reaching consequences for all of us. So it is a huge responsibility that governments as well as everyone on earth has to start seriously looking at and start taking responsibility for and planning for, and we mustn't be taken by surprise since we've known that this disease, and the consequences of this disease, for many years now, but we also have to mobilize the political will to be able to implement those systems and structures and institutions that would help us to be able to deal with the consequences of this disease.

by Audrey Kitagawa

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Benjamin Fahrer: A very big responsibility. AIDS in Africa, people are dying in Africa because of AIDS. We are a global people. We should take it up on ourselves to see all people on this planet worthy, that have worth, that have value and something to contribute to the whole. These are our brothers and sisters, our friends in Africa dying because of this epidemic, because of the situation. So, our responsibility is a global responsibility. It is our responsibility to help and to contribute in a way towards a solution in whichever way we can. This is a huge problem, a huge obstacle for Africa to overcome but also the world to overcome for it’s not just in Africa, it’s all over the world. And we have information and ways to fix this problem. We also must see the cause of this problem, where it is originated from? And how people had been oppressed by not having access to certain commons within their environment? We must allow to these people to have the resources and not be isolated, not be taken as Africa being separate and that we should leave it behind or not help. And quarantine Africa in which it’s happening in some villages and politically is happening as well. It is a huge issue and huge responsibility for all.

by Benjamin Fahrer

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Benson Venegas: Poverty and diseases is not poor people fault. It's something that we share responsibility, all the people that live around this world. To advance in attention of chronic, pandemic, infectious disorders that [inaudible] public health, we need to share the responsibility. There is no boundaries for some of these diseases, and we need to act jointly in a responsible way to redefine solutions to these problems. So, we need to get medicine to every one in a universal way. We need to really change the ethics of the way medicine is being distributed and the way people have access to these medicines that can really cure, or at least minimize the effects, the secondary effects, of diseases like AIDS.

by Benson Venegas

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Beverly Schwartz:

by Beverly Schwartz

Sep 9, 2006 11:05:00 AM cite

Bianca Jagger: Answertext will be available soon.

by Bianca Jagger