A former colleague is on his way to Kenya to work for 3 weeks in an AIDS clinic. Carl is a geneticist, sailing enthusiast, and horse riding nut! Overall a good man...and he is doing wonderful things in his retirement - to tell you the truth, if I'd known about this trip - I would have gone with him. We worked together for years on AIDS diagnostics testing, developing a very cheap but very accurate test that is still being used in certain countries in Africa to this day.
Follow his blog here
6 comments:
See Mim, you made a difference in the world. I'm beginning to think that I never will, at least not on a very large scale. But I keep trying.
How good that must feel to know you have contributed to something so important as a test for AIDS.
This drawing of you in the kyak is wonderful Mim...I feel the peacefulness of the waters and the relaxation in your body...and the smile on your face. Happy vacationing there.
I always felt that I was doing something good for mankind with the development of this test. I truly felt like it was a worthwhile enterprise...and I still do. But for every silver cloud, there is a stormy lining. Someone told me (years ago, and I still pray that it isn't true) that human sex trafficers were using these rapid HIV tests to see which women were HIV positive before getting them into the market. And if positive...they would kill them.
I still have nightmares about this. How can you do good in the world when someone can take your positive actions and turn them into evil.
And remember...these type of tests are not perfect and in order to give rapid results, you have to give something up and usually that means that you will see False Positives. And those sex-trafficers were using these results as final answers? I still can't fathom it.
There is more good done with these tests than bad. Hopefully early treatment is begun. Hopefully someone will keep from passing along the disease if they know that he/she is positive.
But that bad story still haunts me.
Lynn - thanks for the comment on the kayak picture. She does have a rather peaceful look on her face, doesn't she?
Yes, she does.
As to the people trafficters, that sure sounds like an Urban Legend to me. I hope and pray I am right.
sigh....shit....we have to just believe that good will overcome evil (at least some of the time).
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