Amy Harada couldn't be happier as assistant director of AIDS Resource Alliance, 520 W. Fourth St., and of the work it does on behalf of its clients.
But what mystifies and frustrates her is the staggering lack of knowledge that continues to exist about AIDS and the HIV virus.
"We find there's still a lot of apathy," she said.
More than 25 years ago, AIDS stormed into the general consciousness of America with its recognition as a very real and fatal infection.
The fear, general panic and misinformation surrounding HIV/AIDS then emerged.
And while medical science has evolved, providing improved treatment, many original misconceptions remain - an interesting, if disturbing trend a quarter of a century later. Monday brought the annual observance of World AIDS Day.
Many people, Harada believes, simply can't identify with HIV/AIDS because they know no one who has been infected, a general attitude that exists among many area residents.
AIDS Resource is an agency offering advocacy, case management, support, financial assistance and other services to those living with HIV/AIDS.
"A lot of people still don't know we exist in the community," said Harada.
The agency presently serves 113 HIV-infected clients.,
Those numbers have remained fairly steady in recent years, but hardly account for everyone locally who is infected.
In fact, one in four people living with HIV don't know they have it, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
AIDS stands for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, a condition caused by the HIV virus, which weakens the body's immune system, making it prone to diseases it could otherwise protect against.
AIDS was discovered in the United States in 1981 with the confirmation of five cases of an unusual strain of pneumonia in homosexual men.
Since 1981, more than 25 million people have died of complications due to AIDS, according to statistics.
Harada noted that the difference between HIV and AIDS is a CD4 count, or T-cell count.
"Healthy" persons will have a CD4 count between 800 and 1,200. When the number falls to 200, that is when the person is determined to have AIDS.
According to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, HIV is spread most often through unprotected sex, including oral sex, with an infected partner.
It also can be spread through the sharing of needles or syringes, from HIV-infected mothers to the unborn during pregnancy, or to infants after birth from breast milk.
That's one reason Harada would like to see mandatory HIV/AIDS testing for pregnant women.
She noted alarming trends among young people under 25 who account for more than one half of all new HIV infections each year. In addition, women are increasingly becoming infected through heterosexual sex, accounting in 2000 for one in five infections.
Harada said too many people, including educators and even health care professionals such as doctors, contact her agency with the fear that casual contact can spread the virus.
"We had a teacher who called us. She thought she could contract it from a doorknob an infected person had touched," she said. "This is someone who has to pass on (AIDS) facts to students."
Harada lamented the general complacency in the community about AIDS, which in many ways has fallen off the radar screen in recent years, despite its continued spread throughout the world.
Certainly, progress has been made in fighting HIV/AIDS, at one time all but a death sentence to those infected.
"It used to be people died quickly," Harada said.
Better treatment methods through improved drugs have offered a significant step forward for infected persons. However, such positive medical developments have also provided, perhaps, a false belief that there is a cure, when in truth there is not.
Beyond that, the stigma surrounding AIDS continues to exist, preventing many people from seeking help.
"They are afraid of reaction from others," Harada said. "They don't want everyone to know they are infected."
AIDS Resource was formed in 1988 by people concerned about the rising death rate among AIDS victims in Lycoming County. It is funded, in part, by the North Central District AIDS Coalition through the state Department of Health.
More information about the agency and its services may be found at www.aidsresource.com.
