So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Is the problem discrimination or is the problem stupid discrimination? Would it be ok to say, "You can come to Autralia, but you can't have unprotected sex with anyone."?
As previously mentioned, there are already laws against willfully spreading HIV.
I'd rather they also take into account what kind of relationship you're in (if you're coming over with a long-term partner, that should outweigh your HIV+ status) or occupation (at the very least, being high-income means you're less likely to be a drain on the healthcare system).
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Is the problem discrimination or is the problem stupid discrimination? Would it be ok to say, "You can come to Autralia, but you can't have unprotected sex with anyone."?
As previously mentioned, there are already laws against willfully spreading HIV.
I'd rather they also take into account what kind of relationship you're in (if you're coming over with a long-term partner, that should outweigh your HIV+ status) or occupation (at the very least, being high-income means you're less likely to be a drain on the healthcare system).
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
I have this mental image of people standing around hugging people with small pox and leprosy....and then contracting those diseases and dying as they say, "Well...at least we weren't mean to them."
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
When pragmatism outweighs the humane, we're in trouble.
For context, it sounds like an off the cuff remark that he'll be backtracking from soon enough. Also, there's been a couple of trials of guys charged with deliberately spreading AIDS here in the last few months, so that might have fed into it. One was disabled and didn't really get it, but one other was just plain malicious.
I don't get why y'all are crying racist, though. Its primarily a homophobic move on his part. Australia's got a shitty record of accepting refugees, but a heap of them are Africans these days. We've got a pretty decent-sized community of nigerians and somalis here.
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
When pragmatism outweighs the humane, we're in trouble.
So if there are two equal applicants for immigration status, one has AIDS (you could also substitute another disease or mental condition) and one who is perfectly healthy, is it discrimination to pick the healthy one over the sick one?
It just that discrimination against people with a disease, primarily AIDS today, is very tricky and a hard issue to deal with easily.
I don't get why y'all are crying racist, though. Its primarily a homophobic move on his part. Australia's got a shitty record of accepting refugees, but a heap of them are Africans these days. We've got a pretty decent-sized community of nigerians and somalis here.
And to add an economic argument, Australia has a public healthcare system. Allowing people in who are known to have an incurable disease requiring expensive treatment, people who will be a drain on the state's healthcare ressources, is a pretty bad decision for the government to make. Australia has a duty to provide healthcare to its citizens, but not to anyone on Earth who walks up and asks them.
Why single out HIV? Why not diabetes? Or stroke victims?
Why not really old people? I'm sure they cost more than most of the other demographics combined.
They do, its a huge pain if you are 49+ and want to live there. If you're young and in a good profession they'll have you (1-2 years experience) but if you're older or without a desired skill you're looking at £100,000 to get in. Infact I think your relative state of health affect immigration anyway, I'm looking to move out there in a couple of years and it was one of the questions on the form. That was residency rather than emigration though.
I do wonder how much Australia's race problems stem from having backpackers as a reliable source of manual labour sometimes though.
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Is the problem discrimination or is the problem stupid discrimination? Would it be ok to say, "You can come to Autralia, but you can't have unprotected sex with anyone."?
As previously mentioned, there are already laws against willfully spreading HIV.
I'd rather they also take into account what kind of relationship you're in (if you're coming over with a long-term partner, that should outweigh your HIV+ status) or occupation (at the very least, being high-income means you're less likely to be a drain on the healthcare system).
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
I have this mental image of people standing around hugging people with small pox and leprosy....and then contracting those diseases and dying as they say, "Well...at least we weren't mean to them."
except HIV isn't as easily spread as those. Again, the only means of spreading HIV is through, IIRC, bodily fluid exchange. You're not going to have a sudden AIDS epidemic only because you let AIDS victims immigrate. And to think you would seems downright insulting to me, because it's saying "Sorry, you can't be trusted to keep yourself from infecting anyone, get the hell out of our country" right in their face
and don't we have cures for small pox and leprosy?
I don't get why y'all are crying racist, though. Its primarily a homophobic move on his part. Australia's got a shitty record of accepting refugees, but a heap of them are Africans these days. We've got a pretty decent-sized community of nigerians and somalis here.
Why is it either racist or homophobic?
I'm kind of needling at the thought here that AIDS is an African disease. its not anymore, hasn't been for a fairly long time. They've got the most infected, sure, but its hardly a rarity anywhere else, including here.
Hell, its spread well beyond the gay population too, but no-one seems to talk about that either. Its a dick exclusionist move on his part, but i don't think its based on "black people, ew". Our country isn't good to aborigines, but I've never seen anyone lumping africans and aborigines together. The only people i see doing that are on these boards - they're people who don't get that the australian experience with aborigines doesn't parallel the african-american experience so much as the american indian one.
I don't get why y'all are crying racist, though. Its primarily a homophobic move on his part. Australia's got a shitty record of accepting refugees, but a heap of them are Africans these days. We've got a pretty decent-sized community of nigerians and somalis here.
Why is it either racist or homophobic?
It's really hard to describe in text how homophobia and racism translate into HIV-paranoia without coming off sounding like entropykid, but if you actually deal with HIV issues in the real world you see it everywhere. People still think that HIV is a gay (or African) disease, that it would have just gone away a long time ago if all those slutty gay (or black) boys could just keep their dicks in their pants, and that blessed straight (or white) folk wouldn't have to worry about the gay cancer if it weren't for those doubly-damned horny bisexual (or black) men who would love to infect you and your children with AIDS given half a chance. HIV is a scapegoat in which people dress up all sorts of scary subconscious stereotypes.
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
Costs about £5 to cure leprosy, there was always big drives at school assembles to work at leper camps and raise money for it since its only now a big deal in India and the like and half of that is abuse (people seem to think burning the lepers will cure them, not to death intentionally but just keep burning them with petrol until they stop being lepers)
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Is the problem discrimination or is the problem stupid discrimination? Would it be ok to say, "You can come to Autralia, but you can't have unprotected sex with anyone."?
As previously mentioned, there are already laws against willfully spreading HIV.
I'd rather they also take into account what kind of relationship you're in (if you're coming over with a long-term partner, that should outweigh your HIV+ status) or occupation (at the very least, being high-income means you're less likely to be a drain on the healthcare system).
And the humane approach would be to disregard it completely. Your status as a refugee (and let's not pretend that this won't mainly affect them) should not be affected by your health status.
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
I have this mental image of people standing around hugging people with small pox and leprosy....and then contracting those diseases and dying as they say, "Well...at least we weren't mean to them."
This analogy would hold water if we were talking about a choice between banning HIV+ immigrants and having sex with them.
Yeah we can cure Leprosy easily now, but there are still Leper Colonies in places that are poorer and less advanced (except Japan who got in shit for being assholes to Lepers). But also note that most of the general population is immune to Leprosy, and we still don't know for sure how it's passed along.
I have this mental image of people standing around hugging people with small pox and leprosy....and then contracting those diseases and dying as they say, "Well...at least we weren't mean to them."
This analogy would hold water if we were talking about a choice between banning HIV+ immigrants and having sex with them.
It seems that Australia's immigration policies are intended more for the long term, they don't want people to go there to die, they want you to stay and raise a family (I get points to go there for having a long term girlfriend or wife). HIV positive immigrants don't fit with that at all.
Costs about £5 to cure leprosy, there was always big drives at school assembles to work at leper camps and raise money for it since its only now a big deal in India and the like and half of that is abuse (people seem to think burning the lepers will cure them, not to death intentionally but just keep burning them with petrol until they stop being lepers)
That's not entirely accurate. Therapy involves three different drugs, taken as a cocktail on a daily basis. The drugs themselves are inexpensive antibiotics, but depending on the progression of the disease, treatment can take anywhere from 30 days to 24 months and may or may not require additional drugs.
The cost of treating a single case of Hansen's disease in the US in an outpatient setting averages around $1500. Now, this includes professional fees, which are inflated in the US, so this figure wouldn't necessarily translate cleanly to other healthcare systems, but it's still not gonna be £5. The only reason I can think of that it could possibly be that cheap to treat somebody in India is because WHO gives the drugs out for free to treatment programs in poor countries.
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
Costs about £5 to cure leprosy, there was always big drives at school assembles to work at leper camps and raise money for it since its only now a big deal in India and the like and half of that is abuse (people seem to think burning the lepers will cure them, not to death intentionally but just keep burning them with petrol until they stop being lepers)
That's not entirely accurate. Therapy involves three different drugs, taken as a cocktail on a daily basis. The drugs themselves are inexpensive antibiotics, but depending on the progression of the disease, treatment can take anywhere from 30 days to 24 months and may or may not require additional drugs.
The cost of treating a single case of Hansen's disease in the US in an outpatient setting averages around $1500. Now, this includes professional fees, which are inflated in the US, so this figure wouldn't necessarily translate cleanly to other healthcare systems, but it's still not gonna be £5. The only reason I can think of that it could possibly be that cheap to treat somebody in India is because WHO gives the drugs out for free to treatment programs in poor countries.
You're probably right about the WHO providing drugs (combined with volenteer medical workers for the most part). However even at £750, compared to HIV though, that is pretty cheap.
There's already laws concerning the willful spreading of a disease.
Lots of people that have HIV don't know that they have HIV.
As I'm quite aware, but I was addressing (should have quoted I know) _J_ who said:
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Which is a silly thing to say since that's already the case.
There's already laws concerning the willful spreading of a disease.
Lots of people that have HIV don't know that they have HIV.
As I'm quite aware, but I was addressing (should have quoted I know) _J_ who said:
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Which is a silly thing to say since that's already the case.
My point is that you are ok with banning certain actions, you're just arbitrarily choosing which actions are ok to ban.
Person with HIV cannot have sex with an unknowing partner. Ok, we can make that rule. But person with HIV cannot move to Australia is a silly, ignorant rule with no foundation.
Unknowingly infecting someone with an incurable disease and moving to another country - its a big difference. I would expect there to be a lot more limitations on me emigrating than having sex with someone I haven't known for long.
Not having an incurrable disease and having some guarantee that I won't be unemployed for long - less of a difference.
There's already laws concerning the willful spreading of a disease.
Lots of people that have HIV don't know that they have HIV.
As I'm quite aware, but I was addressing (should have quoted I know) _J_ who said:
So would it be ok for the prime minster to place a ban on the actions of those who had HIV? They can do anything they want except engage in activities which could spread the disease. Would that be alright?
Which is a silly thing to say since that's already the case.
My point is that you are ok with banning certain actions, you're just arbitrarily choosing which actions are ok to ban.
Person with HIV cannot have sex with an unknowing partner. Ok, we can make that rule. But person with HIV cannot move to Australia is a silly, ignorant rule with no foundation.
That's what I don't understand.
Here are a few reasons:
People with HIV can be upstanding, contributing citizens.
In many parts of the world, people with HIV are unfairly discriminated against against due to ignorance and stigma that surround the disease. This rule legitimizes this stigma and sends a message to HIV+ people already in the country that they're not wanted. It sends a message around the world that unfair discrimination against HIV+ people is acceptible.
The risk of letting inimmigrants with HIV is minimal as long as your country has in place reasonable domestic policies for control of the HIV epidemic. Conversly, not letting immigrants in is in no way going to guarantee, or even make a dent in, HIV growth rates if aforementioned domestic policies are not already in place. The way to control the growth of HIV is through treatment and education.
Feral on
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
Unfortunately there's sound logic in doing this. If you immigrate while HIV positive, you represent a significant burden to the public health system that we are required to provide you. While yes, I would like to be able to provide everyone with all the anti-retrovirals they need, the problem is that system has a responsibility to serve it's own populace first and it's not like it's gushing cash.
EDIT: That said, I have difficulty imagining that the number of people who could immigrate without being worthwhile contributors in the first place could be very high.
People with HIV can be upstanding, contributing citizens.
In many parts of the world, people with HIV are unfairly discriminated against against due to ignorance and stigma that surround the disease. This rule legitimizes this stigma and sends a message to HIV+ people already in the country that they're not wanted. It sends a message around the world that unfair discrimination against HIV+ people is acceptible.
The risk of letting inimmigrants with HIV is minimal as long as your country has in place reasonable domestic policies for control of the HIV epidemic. Conversly, not letting immigrants in is in no way going to guarantee, or even make a dent in, HIV growth rates if aforementioned domestic policies are not already in place. The way to control the growth of HIV is through treatment and education.
You could say exactly the same about the unemployed though, the only difference is that they have the option of eventually being able to go to Australia to live. But is it a right to be able to go to Australia?
Over 49 I think, but again that might just be residency. You get points for being under 35, that combined with whether you are in a long term relationship, whatever job you do and your experience might push you over the required limit.
Something or other had to do with age 35... establish permanent resident or something.
You need 100 points to become a permanant resident, being a biochemist I get 40 (assuming I have 2 years experience in the field), having a girlfriend/wife for 3+ years I get 5, and for being under 35 I get 60.
I think those are the numbers for when I looked at what I needed to get residency so I could apply for a PhD there, its around those give or take 10-20 depending on your field and age. Over 35 gets you no points, and over 49 starts becoming a penalty and exempts you from certain paths to citizenship/residency
How as no one mentioned HIV/AIDS transmission through IV drug use, shady blood transfusions (see: China, India, Sub-Saharan Africa)? Older transfusions here in the US weren't even screened for HIV until sometime in the early/mid 80's. It didn't help that our president at the time hadn't had sex since the end of the Korean War and was pretty ignorant to the plights of A) gay men black men C) gay black men D) IV drug users (and drug users in general OLOL War on Drugs).
I hope Magic Johnson doesn't want to come visit Australia. He's a black man with HIV. Scary to whitey I'm sure.
GOJIRA! on
"We are cursed," said Iyad Sarraj, a Gaza psychiatrist and a human rights activist. "Our leaders are either Israeli collaborators, asses, or mentally unstable."
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As previously mentioned, there are already laws against willfully spreading HIV.
I'd rather they also take into account what kind of relationship you're in (if you're coming over with a long-term partner, that should outweigh your HIV+ status) or occupation (at the very least, being high-income means you're less likely to be a drain on the healthcare system).
I agree, but recognize that in issues of immigration, sometimes the pragmatic has to outweigh the humane. Particularly when nationalized healthcare is involved.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I have this mental image of people standing around hugging people with small pox and leprosy....and then contracting those diseases and dying as they say, "Well...at least we weren't mean to them."
When pragmatism outweighs the humane, we're in trouble.
For context, it sounds like an off the cuff remark that he'll be backtracking from soon enough. Also, there's been a couple of trials of guys charged with deliberately spreading AIDS here in the last few months, so that might have fed into it. One was disabled and didn't really get it, but one other was just plain malicious.
I don't get why y'all are crying racist, though. Its primarily a homophobic move on his part. Australia's got a shitty record of accepting refugees, but a heap of them are Africans these days. We've got a pretty decent-sized community of nigerians and somalis here.
So if there are two equal applicants for immigration status, one has AIDS (you could also substitute another disease or mental condition) and one who is perfectly healthy, is it discrimination to pick the healthy one over the sick one?
It just that discrimination against people with a disease, primarily AIDS today, is very tricky and a hard issue to deal with easily.
Why is it either racist or homophobic?
They do, its a huge pain if you are 49+ and want to live there. If you're young and in a good profession they'll have you (1-2 years experience) but if you're older or without a desired skill you're looking at £100,000 to get in. Infact I think your relative state of health affect immigration anyway, I'm looking to move out there in a couple of years and it was one of the questions on the form. That was residency rather than emigration though.
I do wonder how much Australia's race problems stem from having backpackers as a reliable source of manual labour sometimes though.
except HIV isn't as easily spread as those. Again, the only means of spreading HIV is through, IIRC, bodily fluid exchange. You're not going to have a sudden AIDS epidemic only because you let AIDS victims immigrate. And to think you would seems downright insulting to me, because it's saying "Sorry, you can't be trusted to keep yourself from infecting anyone, get the hell out of our country" right in their face
and don't we have cures for small pox and leprosy?
I'm kind of needling at the thought here that AIDS is an African disease. its not anymore, hasn't been for a fairly long time. They've got the most infected, sure, but its hardly a rarity anywhere else, including here.
Hell, its spread well beyond the gay population too, but no-one seems to talk about that either. Its a dick exclusionist move on his part, but i don't think its based on "black people, ew". Our country isn't good to aborigines, but I've never seen anyone lumping africans and aborigines together. The only people i see doing that are on these boards - they're people who don't get that the australian experience with aborigines doesn't parallel the african-american experience so much as the american indian one.
It's really hard to describe in text how homophobia and racism translate into HIV-paranoia without coming off sounding like entropykid, but if you actually deal with HIV issues in the real world you see it everywhere. People still think that HIV is a gay (or African) disease, that it would have just gone away a long time ago if all those slutty gay (or black) boys could just keep their dicks in their pants, and that blessed straight (or white) folk wouldn't have to worry about the gay cancer if it weren't for those doubly-damned horny bisexual (or black) men who would love to infect you and your children with AIDS given half a chance. HIV is a scapegoat in which people dress up all sorts of scary subconscious stereotypes.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
That's not entirely accurate. Therapy involves three different drugs, taken as a cocktail on a daily basis. The drugs themselves are inexpensive antibiotics, but depending on the progression of the disease, treatment can take anywhere from 30 days to 24 months and may or may not require additional drugs.
The cost of treating a single case of Hansen's disease in the US in an outpatient setting averages around $1500. Now, this includes professional fees, which are inflated in the US, so this figure wouldn't necessarily translate cleanly to other healthcare systems, but it's still not gonna be £5. The only reason I can think of that it could possibly be that cheap to treat somebody in India is because WHO gives the drugs out for free to treatment programs in poor countries.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
True story.
People are the leading cause of the spread of disease.
If we could just keep people from having sex, we can stop the spread of people.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
I like it.
Get the scientiest working on the tube tying technology.
You're probably right about the WHO providing drugs (combined with volenteer medical workers for the most part). However even at £750, compared to HIV though, that is pretty cheap.
We need to get our priorities in order!
First we need to develop a car magnet in the shape of a colored ribbon! For awareness!
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
As I'm quite aware, but I was addressing (should have quoted I know) _J_ who said:
Which is a silly thing to say since that's already the case.
My point is that you are ok with banning certain actions, you're just arbitrarily choosing which actions are ok to ban.
Person with HIV cannot have sex with an unknowing partner. Ok, we can make that rule. But person with HIV cannot move to Australia is a silly, ignorant rule with no foundation.
That's what I don't understand.
Not having an incurrable disease and having some guarantee that I won't be unemployed for long - less of a difference.
Here are a few reasons:
People with HIV can be upstanding, contributing citizens.
In many parts of the world, people with HIV are unfairly discriminated against against due to ignorance and stigma that surround the disease. This rule legitimizes this stigma and sends a message to HIV+ people already in the country that they're not wanted. It sends a message around the world that unfair discrimination against HIV+ people is acceptible.
The risk of letting inimmigrants with HIV is minimal as long as your country has in place reasonable domestic policies for control of the HIV epidemic. Conversly, not letting immigrants in is in no way going to guarantee, or even make a dent in, HIV growth rates if aforementioned domestic policies are not already in place. The way to control the growth of HIV is through treatment and education.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
EDIT: That said, I have difficulty imagining that the number of people who could immigrate without being worthwhile contributors in the first place could be very high.
You could say exactly the same about the unemployed though, the only difference is that they have the option of eventually being able to go to Australia to live. But is it a right to be able to go to Australia?
You need 100 points to become a permanant resident, being a biochemist I get 40 (assuming I have 2 years experience in the field), having a girlfriend/wife for 3+ years I get 5, and for being under 35 I get 60.
I think those are the numbers for when I looked at what I needed to get residency so I could apply for a PhD there, its around those give or take 10-20 depending on your field and age. Over 35 gets you no points, and over 49 starts becoming a penalty and exempts you from certain paths to citizenship/residency
I hope Magic Johnson doesn't want to come visit Australia. He's a black man with HIV. Scary to whitey I'm sure.
Heh heh. It's like a computer game!
If that one Aussie ex was a citizen, I could totally min-max my way in to Australia.