HIV/AIDS

Medicine has played a key role in the control over bodies that are diagnosed with HIV/AIDS and the medicalization of being categorised as a ‘deviant’ or ‘abnormal’ body through surveillance, monitoring and developmental drugs/medication. Emergence of HIV (Human Immuno-deficiency Virus) Aids (Acquired immune-deficiency syndrome) in 1981 originally “labelled GRID (gay-related immune deficiency)” (Dalton, 2017:65) in which was spread through bodily fluids and has still no current cure. In an article within the ‘centres for disease control’s morbidity and mortality weekly report (MMWR) members of the medical establishment recognised a group of five cases among gay men with an infection of the lungs and severe impairment of their immune system diagnosed between 1980-81 who were otherwise healthy. (Pepin, 2011:1) HIV/AIDS was viewed as a deficiency in the body that had to potential to re-medicalise homosexuality and was viewed as a result of gay men’s lifestyles. “Aids was regarded as a disease of lifestyle- Fast lane gay lifestyle” (Dalton, 2017:65.) Finding a way to medicalise HIV in relation to gay men i.e. If you were gay, you had HIV therefore you were ill and needed treatment. This was before it was discovered that HIV is also transmitted through blood.

Social forces played a key role in defining HIV/AIDS and promoting the risk to the public. Media contributed to constructing and societies notions HIV/AIDS as a social problem and linking it to homosexuality. As a result, the disease was conceptualized as a form of a deviant body and highlighting it’s ‘abnormalities’ based on the risk to the public, which contributed to the state of moral panic. What is seen as societies ‘normal’ and making sure that members remain within the social barriers and refrain from what is viewed as deviant. The media linked the disease to words associated with death such as ‘mortality’ and victimized groups affected by HIV and denied them as part of society.

Furthermore, the moral panic that was associated with HIV/AIDS throughout the epidemic in the 1980’s created the ideal environment for certain groups to be collectively stigmatised due to lifestyle and how the disease is contracted. This is shown within (Goffman’s, 1997) work on stigma within medicalization of a social problem such as this. Those with HIV/Aids where represented in the media as ‘deviant’ and ‘contaminated’ to categorise those who are linked to the spread of the disease and in this case, gay men.

In relation to Illich, social control took over HIV and the matter of social control lead it to be medicalised from what society seen HIV as. Being homosexual within society was seen as frowned upon and was seen as a social problem of deviance, therefore when HIV came about and seen in gay men, it was seen as a way of victimising and medicalising homosexuals from being “deviant” to society to being ill/diseased. The threat that society had on HIV created a “risk society”- society pushed homosexuals out of society to avoid the risk of getting HIV- “Risks conceptualise as diseases’’ (Fainzang 2013:887) which links to the work of Beck (1992) who suggests we live in a society based on risk and fear of those who deviate from the norm. This risk can be managed through medical control. Therefore, those with HIV AIDS are controlled by being categorised as deviant because of the risk of being contagious. The medical establishment then became prominent to this in which realised emergence of Anti-retroviral therapy and a medical treatment for possible exposure to HIV- called “post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) may stop you becoming infected if started within 72 hours” (NHS, 2018). Which is prevalent in Beck’s (1992) risk society, as medication has been developed to minimise the risk of being deviant and contracting the disease through medical control. ART has also allowed medicine to take over and gain control through surveillance of people’s bodies living with HIV. Therefore, “the solution to medicalization is self help” (Illich, 1975) by taking responsibility for your own health risks and taking the medication available.