Материал: 5577

111

Evgeniya Ilchuk,

5th year student, International Economic Relations Department, Far Eastern Institute of International Relations Scientific adviser: Elena N. Albey, Instructor

PREVENTING OF DRUG ABUSE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

One of the extremely complex and socially dangerous problems of our society is the drug abuse. It is easy to notice, that distribution of drugs and psychotropic substances touches interests of all mankind and in the long term the existence of a society in general. Traditionally the policy of struggle against drug abuse in the USA is based on a combination of informational, socially-precaution, medical and repressive approaches. Each of them has the advantages and disadvantages. The information approach is based on conscious perception of norms and values of a society. It is a question of propagation of a healthy way of life and about informing of negative consequences of drug abuse. Social precaution is aimed at elimination of external (social and economic, socially-psychological) reasons and conditions of a deviating behavior. The medical approach helps to overcome internal, subjective obstacles in a stressful situation. The application of sanctions protects the standard rules of behavior, using the opportunities of compulsion for their violation. The main accent is done on the struggle against drug-dealers. Application of sanctions against drug-dealers and drug users is the main strategy of struggle against drugs .Nowadays the rigid control over all kinds of drugs is carried out. There is an active opposition to drug-dealers. There is a punishment not only for storage and the use, but also even for attempt of purchase of drugs in many states of America. Struggle against drugs in the sphere of the law is combined with the most powerful informational and propaganda campaign aimed, first of all, at the most vulnerable categories of the population - unemployed, pupils of schools and students.

Drug abuse is connected with the huge losses for a society - annually the damage from it makes approximately 150 billion dollars. The American government does the main rate on propagation of a healthy way of life. Employees of the governmental organizations and many business concerns were obliged to pass testing on drug abuse because their further career depended on its result.

The strategy-program on drug abuse struggle:

1.Recognition of a problem of a drug abuse as national and development of the long-term program-strategy for ten years;

2.Allocation of necessary financial resources for law-enforcement structures in order to conduct an active struggle both inside of the country, and behind its border;

3.International cooperation with the purpose of drugs receipts prevention on the territory of the USA;

4.Well-defined informational campaign. It is easier to prevent the use of drugs, than to treat patients;

5.Purposeful and wide involvement of social movements and structures at all levels - from national up to communes;

6.bringing of the most significant political (including the President of the USA) and public figures (movie stars and sportsmen) in anti-drugs campaign;

7.Stimulation of the commercial and financial structures which are taking part in a struggle against drugs.

It is necessary to note, that expenses on anti-drug campaign for the last years were about one billion dollars annually. The certain efforts are undertaken from the United Nations Organization in international level.

112

First of all, it is the steps of the information plan connected with carrying out of a global monitoring of a state of affairs with drugs and development of the general recommendations to the governments on drug abuse struggle. The problem of a drug addiction rises practically in all key documents of the UN and its specialized agencies.

Secondly, rendering of the practical help to a number of the countries-manufacturers of drugs in order to reorient the peasants to cultivation of agricultural structures (first of all in a number of the states of Latin America).

Thirdly, conducting the register of forbidden drugs. Nowadays it includes about 200 drugs from which only seven are natural, and the others - synthetic.

Viktoriya Katkova,

4th year student, International Economic Relations Department, Far Eastern Institute of International Relations Scientific advisers: Elena N. Albey, Lydmila A. Fisyk, Instructors

PREVENTING THE SPREAD OF HIV AND REDUCING ITS IMPACT

This report is about AIDS/HIV, its consequences and how to prevent you from this disease. AIDS is one of the most important diseases in XXI century. Till nowadays people can’t cure AIDS, and a lot of people die from it every year. The most difficult situation is in

Africa. I used three countries: China, the USA and Brazil in the report and described the situation with this disease.

Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS or Aids) is a collection of symptoms and infections resulting from the specific damage to the immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in humans, and similar viruses in other species (SIV, FIV, etc.). Although treatments for AIDS and HIV exist to decelerate the virus' progression, there is currently no known cure.

Most researchers believe that HIV originated in sub-Saharan Africa during the twentieth century;[4] it is now a pandemic, with an estimated 38.6 million people now living with the disease worldwide. As of January 2006, the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the World Health Organization (WHO) estimate that AIDS has killed more than 25 million people since it was first recognized on June 5, 1981, making it one of the most destructive epidemics in recorded history. In 2005 alone, AIDS claimed an estimated 2.4–3.3 million lives, of which more than 570,000 were children. A third of these deaths are occurring in sub-Saharan Africa, retarding economic growth and destroying human capital. Antiretroviral treatment reduces both the mortality and the morbidity of HIV infection, but routine access to antiretroviral medication is not available in all countries.

Many people are unaware that they are infected with HIV. Less than 1% of the sexually active urban population in Africa has been tested, and this proportion is even lower in rural populations. Furthermore, only 0.5% of pregnant women attending urban health facilities are counseled, tested or receive their test results. Again, this proportion is even lower in rural health facilities. Therefore, donor blood and blood products used in medicine and medical research are screened for HIV. Typical HIV tests, including the HIV enzyme immunoassay and the Western blot assay, detect HIV antibodies in serum, plasma, oral fluid, dried blood spot or urine of patients. However, the window period (the time between initial infection and the development of detectable antibodies against the infection) can vary. This is why it can take 3 – 6 months to seroconvert and test positive.

Commercially available tests to detect other HIV antigens, HIV-RNA, and HIV-DNA in order to detect HIV infection prior to the development of detectable antibodies are available.

113

For the diagnosis of HIV infection these assays are not specifically approved, but are nonetheless routinely used in developed countries.

The symptoms of AIDS are primarily the result of conditions that do not normally develop in individuals with healthy immune systems. Most of these conditions are infections caused by bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites that are normally controlled by the elements of the immune system that HIV damages. Opportunistic infections are common in people with AIDS. HIV affects nearly every organ system. People with AIDS also have an increased risk of developing various cancers such as Kaposi's sarcoma, cervical cancer and cancers of the immune system known as lymphomas. Additionally, people with AIDS often have systemic symptoms of infection like fevers, sweats (particularly at night), swollen glands, chills, weakness, and weight loss.

The three main transmission routes of HIV are sexual contact, exposure to infected body fluids or tissues, and from mother to fetus or child during perinatal period. It is possible to find HIV in the saliva, tears, and urine of infected individuals, but there are no recorded cases of infection by these secretions, and the risk of infection is negligible.

The majority of HIV infections are acquired through unprotected sexual relations between partners, one of whom has HIV. Heterosexual intercourse is the primary mode of HIV infection worldwide. Sexual transmission occurs with the contact between sexual secretions of one partner with the rectal, genital or oral mucous membranes of another. Unprotected receptive sexual acts are riskier than unprotected insertive sexual acts, with the risk for transmitting HIV from an infected partner to an uninfected partner through unprotected anal intercourse greater than the risk for transmission through vaginal intercourse or oral sex. Oral sex is not without its risks as HIV is transmissible through both insertive and receptive oral sex.

Exposure to infected body fluids is particularly relevant to intravenous drug users, hemophiliacs and recipients of blood transfusions and blood products. Sharing and reusing syringes contaminated with HIV-infected blood represents a major risk for infection with not only HIV, but also hepatitis B and hepatitis C. Needle sharing is the cause of one third of all new HIV-infections and 50% of hepatitis C infections in North America, China, and Eastern Europe. The risk of being infected with HIV from a single prick with a needle that has been used on an HIV-infected person is thought to be about 1 in 150.

All AIDS-prevention organizations advise drug-users not to share needles and other material required to prepare and take drugs (including syringes, cotton balls, the spoons, water for diluting the drug, straws, crack pipes, etc). It is important that people use new or properly sterilized needles for each injection. Information on cleaning needles using bleach is available from health care and addiction professionals and from needle exchanges. In some developed countries, clean needles are available free in some cities, at needle exchanges or safe injection sites. Additionally, many nations have decriminalized needle possession and made it possible to buy injection equipment from pharmacists without a prescription.

The transmission of the virus from the mother to the child can occur in utero during the last weeks of pregnancy and at childbirth. In the absence of treatment, the transmission rate between the mother to the child during pregnancy, labor and delivery is 25%. However, when the mother has access to antiretroviral therapy and gives birth by caesarean section, the rate of transmission is just 1%. A number of factors influence the risk of infection, particularly the viral load of the mother at birth (the higher the load, the higher the risk). Breastfeeding increases the risk of transmission by 10–15%. This risk depends on clinical factors and may vary according to the pattern and duration of breast-feeding.

Prevention strategies are well known in developed countries, however, recent epidemiological and behavioral studies in Europe and North America have suggested that a substantial minority of young people continue to engage in high-risk practices and that despite HIV/AIDS knowledge, young people underestimate their own risk of becoming infected with

114

HIV. However, transmission of HIV between intravenous drug users has clearly decreased, and HIV transmission by blood transfusion has become quite rare in developed countries.

The United States of America has one of the largest HIV epidemics in the world, with an estimated 1.2 million [720 000–2.0 million] people living with HIV in 2005 (UNAIDS, 2006). Based on data from the 33 states and four dependent territories with long-term, confidential name-based HIV reporting, men still account for most of the HIV or AIDS diagnoses among adults and adolescents in the United States: 74% in 2005, according to the most recent data.

Unprotected sex between men remains the most common mode of HIV transmission. In 2005, more than half of the new diagnoses of HIV infection (53%) were among men who have sex with men. Persons exposed to HIV through heterosexual intercourse with a nonregular partner comprised just under one third (32%) of newly diagnosed HIV infections and AIDS cases, while about 18% of newly diagnosed HIV infections in 2005 occurred in injecting drug users (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention).

The main routes of HIV transmission differ between men and women. Most HIV infections diagnosed among men in 2005 (67%) occurred in men who have sex with men with no history of injecting drug use, 5% in men who have sex with men who were injecting drug users, and 13% among injecting drug users who did not have sex with men. An additional 15% of infections were attributed to heterosexual intercourse with a non-regular partner.

More information has become available on the effects of wider access to effective antiretroviral therapy in the United States. In the state of South Carolina, found that 41% of diagnosed HIV cases in 2001–2005 were such “late testers”. In the latter study, three quarters (73%) of the “late testers” had visited health-care providers at least once before being diagnosed with HIV, but most had not displayed symptoms that would have prompted HIV testing under a risk-based testing strategy. Based on these findings, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States has recommended routine, opt-out HIV screening of all patients in healthcare settings (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2006).

About one third of all persons living with HIV in Latin America reside in populous Brazil, where a simultaneous focus on ensuring access to prevention and treatment services has helped to keep its epidemic stable. National adult HIV prevalence has stayed at approximately 0.5% [0.3%–1.6%] since 2000 (UNAIDS, 2006). Mother-to-child transmission of HIV was sharply reduced after 1997 (de Brito et al., 2006), from an estimated 16% nationally in 1997 to less than 4% in 2002 (Dourado et al., 2006).

Although HIV infections have been reported in each of China’s provinces, most of the people living with HIV in China are believed to be in Henan, Guangdong, Guangxi, Xinjiang and Yunnan provinces (Ministry of Health China, 2006). In Yunnan province, HIV surveillance at antenatal service sites found that 0.3% [0.21%– 0.31%] of pregnant women was infected with HIV, although prevalence was as high as 1.6% in some counties (Zhang, Hu & Hesketh, 2006). A little less than half the estimated 700 000 [390 000–1.1 million] people living with HIV in China in 2006 are believed to have been infected while injecting drugs with contaminated equipment, while a similar proportion acquired the virus during unprotected sex (Ministry of Health China, 2006; Lu et al., 2006).

The overlap of injecting drug use and sex work is an important aspect of China’s HIV epidemic. An increasing number of women are injecting drug users in China and, in some places, as many as half of those who do so also sell sex. Many male injecting drug users also buy sex, often without using condoms.

Overall, though, China has stepped up its response to the HIV epidemic in recent years. Free HIV testing is available at more than 3000 sites in all 31 provinces (Wu et al., 2007), and an estimated 30 000 patients were receiving antiretroviral treatment at the end of 2006 (Wu et al., 2007). However, research suggests that the response would benefit considerably from

115

stronger coordination between and across relevant agencies and actors, and from a more concerted focus on most-at-risk groups (Gill, Huang & Lu, 2007). In addition, improved comanagement of HIV and tuberculosis needs to be a priority and should include improved laboratory diagnosis, earlier commencement of antiretroviral treatment, stronger adherence strategies and better community awareness. Field studies are reporting significant levels of co infections of HIV and tuberculosis. In a rural study in 2003–2005, nearly one quarter (22%) of persons with HIV also had tuberculosis. Death rates among them were high, largely due to low tuberculosis treatment completion rates (Dahmane et al., 2006). Overall, although high levels of risky behavior have been documented in some provinces of China, and prevalence of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections are increasing in some population groups, it is difficult to generalize on the basis of that information. China’s HIV epidemic is heterogeneous and is evolving at different rates in different regions.

Oleg Korobkov,

4th year student, International Economic Relations Department, Far Eastern Institute of International Relations Scientific advisers: Elena N. Albey, Lydmila A. Fisyk, Instructors

HUMAN IMMUNODEFICIENCY VIRUS SITUATION IN RUSSIA AND CHINA

This is the report about HIV situation in two countries: Russian Federation and People's Respublic of China. There are two main logical parts: Situtation with HIV in the country and mejures of preventing HIV. Both of the countries estimated by the same parameters.

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a lentivirus (a member of the retroviruses family) that can lead to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in humans in which the immune system ,begins to fail, leading to life-threatening opportunistic infections. Previous names for the virus include human T-lymphotropic virus-III (HTLV-III), lymphadenopathy-associated virus (LAV), and AIDS-associated retrovirus (ARV).

Infection with HIV occurs by the transfer of blood semen, vaginal fluid, pre-ejaculate, or breast milk. Within these bodily fluids, HIV is present as both free virus particles and virus within infected immune cells. The four major routes of transmission are unprotected sexual intercourse, contaminated needles, breast milk, and transmission from an infected mother to her baby at birth (Vertical transmission). Screening of blood products for HIV has largely eliminated transmission through blood transfusions or infected blood products in the developed world.

HIV infection in humans is now pandemic. As of January 2006, the Joint United Nationas Programme on HIV\AIDS(UNAIDS) and the World Health Organization (WHO) estimate that AIDS has killed more than 25 million people since it was first recognized on December 1, 1981. It is estimated that about 0.6 percent of the world's population is infected with HIV. In 2005 alone, AIDS claimed an estimated 2.4–3.3 million lives, of which more than 570,000 were children.

HIV in Russia

Russia has recently emerged as a new epicenter in the global HIV/AIDS pandemic, with one of the world's highest rates of new infection. As of August 2003, there have been more than 245,000 officially diagnosed cases of HIV infection in Russia, over 80 percent of which were reported in the last three years. It is widely acknowledged, however, that Russia's official statistics represent only a fraction of the actual number of HIV-infected Russians; most experts estimate that the true number is somewhere between 1.5 million and 2 million citizens, or over 2 percent of the adult population.

Epidemiologists warn that up to 8 million Russians - over 10 percent of the adult