Hans Rosling gave a speech in February of 2009 at a TED conference. He intended to give the audience information and statistics about HIV.
Almost everyone has heard of HIV, but as I learned by watching this speech, many are very misinformed. Rosling meant to give the audience further insight into the virus in hopes that knowledge will help with prevention and public acceptance/understanding.
“Rosling believes that making information more accessible has the potential to change the quality of the information itself.” — Business Week Online
He uses interactive charts to engage the audience and keep their attention. He also uses humor to connect with the audience, but he mixes it with a very serious tone, so as not to diminish the solemnity of the illness.
"A steady state doesn't mean that things are getting better, it's just that they have stopped getting worse" - Hans Rosling
One not as well known fact that Rosling brought to the audiences attention during his speech is that hetero (male-female) sex causes HIV as much as homo (male-male or female-female) sex does. Many people assume that HIV/Aids is a gay-specific illness, but that is not true.
Rosling also brought up an issue with a lot of data we have on HIV. Many statistics are not necessarily correct since the data does not take into consideration that those in poorer countries die sooner than those in wealthier countries that can afford treatment. So wealthier countries often have a very steady rate, where poorer ones rise and fall often.
Did this speech teach you things you didn't know about HIV, and did it make you sympathize more with people who have this disease?
ReplyDeleteYes it did to both! Before, I didn't realize that many straight people also get the disease, it made it a little more relateable for me.
DeleteGood explanation, however it seems lacking in personal feelings. What is Rosling's background with HIV personal experience? Family members? Researcher?
ReplyDeleteHans Rosling is a physician and he researches statistics and medicine. He has also worked with many agencies that aid those who are sick in other countries that are less fortunate than America.
DeleteWhere does this kind of misunderstanding stem from? I would be interested to know if the speech touched on that at all.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHe didn't really talk about that much, but I would assume most of the misunderstanding comes from the media's portrayal of the disease, since many of the most famous people who have had HIV are homosexual males.
ReplyDelete