The Australians Government Name

Running head: HIV/AIDS RESPONSE 1
Response towards HIV/AIDS by the Australians Government
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HIV/AIDS RESPONSE 2
The first case of Human Immunodeficiency Virus/ Acquired Deficiency Syndrome
(HIV/AIDS) in Australia was detected and noted in November, 1982. The first demise due HIV
infection was reported in Australia in July 1984. The speedy increase of HIV/AIDS cases was
noted in the 1980s. The scientific research databases are the ones that can be useful to provide an
exclusive justification of the Australian epidemic of HIV/AIDS. The government of Australia
begins strategies in response to the rapid spread of the disease to control and curb the HIV
epidemic (Bell, Aggleton, & Slavin, 2018).
The response by the government of Australia helped it to relieve the financial burden of
treating the large cases of HIV patients. Also, it spared thousands of Australian youths from
getting infected and prevent early deaths from the deadly disease. The first strategy composed
several concepts that were derivative from the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion in 1986
which still is useful by Australia in responding to the virus. The features of the first strategy
were retained in the second, third and fourth strategy (Deeks et al., 2016).
History
HIV/AIDS emerged as an unidentifiable, fatal, and infectious disease in the early 1980s
and it posed an alarm to the Australian government which led to its response policy towards it.
The disease mostly affected several stigmatized communities. 23, 989 cases of HIV/AIDS were
reported in Australia by 30th September 2004. In the mid-1980s, there was a prompt upsurge of
the HIV/AIDS caseload but the new cases of infected individuals reduced significantly when the
prevalence of the disease did not hold on the general heterosexual groups. Instead, the disease
was mostly contained in the groups that were first affected by the virus. There had been 6,459
deaths by 2004 which were due to the AIDS infection (Hampton et al, 2017).

HIV/AIDS RESPONSE 3
The response by the government was a ground-breaking policy that entrenched in three
major principles. The key principles include; community engagement, bilateral support and
partnership. The relative response of Australia towards HIV/AIDS came about because of health
challenges posed to the lives of Australians by the disease epidemic including the general public,
clinicians, provincial and researchers and national government, civil society organizations,
imaginative and practical response to the complex political, economic, public and social.
Australia did not build its HIV/AIDS response from the top down but its response was initiated
from the grassroots up (Kay, Batey, & Mugavero, 2016).
Besides the tumultuous of early response to the disease by Australia, a partnership developed
Australia’s political leaders, provincial and national government, researcher’s organization's
clinicians and community groups that were involved with HIV/AIDS disease. The existence of
this partnership for around 25 years has enhanced a firm basis for the development of the
proceeding HIV/AIDS strategies, which encompass prevention, treatment, research, education
and care. In the 1990s, the epidemic of HIV/AIDS in Australia reached a “steady-state”. In 1994
the number Australian who had HIV infection who were 13,737 increased to 20,580 in 2003; this
was due to the introduction of the new, improved treatment (McKay, 2016).
Reasons Behind the Policy
The initial response of Australia towards the emergence of the HIV/AIDS depended on the
political, cultural and social environment within the 1980s. The first strategy of the Australian
National aids policy implemented in 1989 contained three goals; taking care of the infected
persons, control and restrain the spread of the HIV/AIDS transmission, and providing support
and education to the healthcare professionals. This national strategy has been maintained through
this policy. The framework was to ensure Australia’s HIV/AIDS policy response has been