These first two chapters threw out so many statistics that I felt overwhelmed at the magnitude of the situation, which I already knew was severe. As I read, however, I questioned at the accuracy of the numbers because of the impracticality of measuring such things as infections and diseases in such huge populations of people all across the globe, especially in underdeveloped countries and poor areas.
One aspect of this reading that I found particularly intriguing was on page 5 of chapter one when the authors brought up the issue of what humans value today. I especially liked the quote “Apart from the purely humanitarian aspects—that we do not want to see others suffer and our heartstrings are torn by the sight of the derivations among swathes of the world’s population—on cool reflection, labour is not required in the quantities that once it was” (Barnett and Whiteside 8). In our developed, advanced society today, is that all that underprivileged people are good for? I like that the authors subtly posed this question and revealed this side of rich society mentality. Most people would probably completely deny this thought, because they wouldn’t want to seem cold or un-empathetic. It is interesting to ponder the emotions large populations feel towards this epidemic because from personal experience, I feel very detached from the disease as well as from information on it. Such a stab at the mindset of much of mankind is quite a radical approach, albeit unsurprisingly radical in today’s world of fantastic literature, but it’s a provocative statement that hopefully causes many another to pause.
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