Indonesians Want To Microchip AIDS Patients 120
Lawmakers in Papua, Indonesia have thrown their support behind a bill requiring some HIV/AIDS patients to be implanted with microchips in order to better monitor the disease. In addition, legislator John Manangsang said by implanting chips in "sexually aggressive" patients, authorities would be in a better position to identify, track and punish those who deliberately infect others. Health workers and rights activists sharply criticized the plan. It would make the dating scene a lot less scary if you could carry your AIDS chip reader into the club.
false sense of security (Score:3, Insightful)
i'd expect this to lead to a false sense of security, causing a rise in the casual encounter rate, followed rapidly by a huge growth in the infection rate.
but, i'm paranoid.
How is this goping to work .... (Score:3, Insightful)
Better solution (Score:2, Insightful)
Tattoo it to their genitalia. That way, nobody would know except for the people they deliberately tried to infect.
No Testing (Score:1, Insightful)
If this were to happen the amount of people who actually get tested for AIDS or HIV would drop. Just being marked like that would make people hesitate, and that is not something we want. I would rather have everyone get tested than have the number of people tested drop dramatically but know for sure those who did test positive have it.
Re:Portable testing (Score:2, Insightful)
Which is more ethical? (Score:4, Insightful)
Prior to the 1950s an epidemic to the magnitude of AIDS would have had those infected with it quarantined and provided with free medical care. That is free drugs, and a clean sterile environment so they could live as pain-free as possible.
Today we let them go about their business and charge them extravagant rates for medications which is beyond the ability of many to pay.
Re:false sense of security (Score:3, Insightful)
Furthermore I would expect less people to get checked. Lower rates of detection and higher rates of unknown infection rates followed by even more infections.
This will only end badly.
This is cause for concern. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not a end-times Christian or a conspiracy theorist ( okay, a *sometimes* conspiracy theorist ), but I see this as a stepping stone to a path of complete control over the individual. If you can be electronically identified against your will at a distance, you lose a basic freedom not to be surveilled. You lose a fundamental right to privacy and anonymity.
If the power were in the hands of the individual -- say, I could remove the chip any time I wanted, I could identify anyone I wanted, I could know where the president was and who he was with at any time, then it would be a different story. But of course you can't remove the microchip -- that goes against the whole idea of the thing. To be monitored without your consent. It's power-over. If everyone were microchipped, we would live in a pan-opticon society, where our invisible overlords know our every move.
First it was pets, now it's dangerous disease-spreaders, next criminals and predators, after that children and elderly, in case they get lost, finally everybody, just to walk down the street and buy a drink at the corner store.
I think you and I disagree on ethics... (Score:3, Insightful)
It is true that some people are innocent who have AIDS. However, these are the victims. It is a horrible chain reaction which may sentence several innocent people to death because of the irresponsible actions of a single individual.
Why would you fear an invisible chip when you are innocent? If you do not intend to pass on this terrible disease which will take your life then why worry? This isn't a small matter of convenience. This is life and death. It is true that some people may find out that an innocent person has AIDS and this may hurt their ability to connect with their family. But this is not likely, and it's completely understandable to someone who has AIDS. What is the cost that others will not die in the way that you have?
Any other view would would be akin to a protecting a serial killer because you used to room with the guy and you're afraid of the social stigma.
Re:Portable testing (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, which is why it is being used in Africa and not in North America, Europe, etc.
Re:Portable testing (Score:5, Insightful)
99% is not good enough for something as rare as AIDS.
It completely depends on the way you use the information.
If you decide to forgo sex with anyone who shows a positive reading, whether a true or false positive, you've just cut down your rate of exposure by 99%. Sure that still leaves the other 1%, but as long as you don't take a negative reading as justification to have unprotected sex, you are no worse off than you would be without the tester.
Is everyone smart enough to use a test like that? No, but you can only do so much to cater to the stupidest people of society,I say the chances are those are the same people that would have unprotected sex anyway.
Re:Better solution (Score:4, Insightful)
Tattoo it to their genitalia. That way, nobody would know except for the people they deliberately tried to infect.
Unless they had an accident, needed surgery & the Doctors / Nurses refused to work on them?
I don't want to Godwin this thread early, but forcible tattooing [wikipedia.org] is really not a particularly civilised idea....
Bad math can be deadly (Score:4, Insightful)
It would make the dating scene a lot less scary if you could carry your AIDS chip reader into the club.
It shouldn't. It would be extremely foolhardy to assume that all people infected with AIDS will be chipped. Hell, many people don't even know it themselves (yet). You would be no better off relying on a chip, or a tattoo because of the false negative effect. You still have treat everyone you meet as potentially infected.
The only thing this chip would do is make it easier to persecute the people who have sought medical help for their condition. One obvious side-effect will be that people who suspect they are infected will be reluctant to get tested in order to avoid the stigma of the chip. That's the same reason we have doctor-patient confidentiality - if you can't trust your doctor not to rat you out, then people will seek black-market treatments and the social health problem becomes worse over the long run.
I say to any potential overlords who want this... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:I think you and I disagree on ethics... (Score:4, Insightful)
Good point, we should probably just chip everyone since it's invisible, small, and only licensed physicians can read it for privacy.
Your personal data will never be shared with anyone.
People with AIDS have rights too. We let people buy guns which can be used to kill people. We then punish them for it. I see no reason to fight Futurecrime in such a barbaric manner as tagging them.
Re:I think you and I disagree on ethics... (Score:5, Insightful)
Any other view would would be akin to a protecting a serial killer because you used to room with the guy and you're afraid of the social stigma.
Or we could just be protecting the witches, the anarchists, the commies, the blacks, the hippies, the Michael Bolton fans, and the AIDS patients because we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.
Silly Indonesians (Score:2, Insightful)
Only after you stop the terrorists and save the children do you require it for AIDS patients, and senior citizens, and prisoners, and high school students. Then, you require it for "discounts" at the grocery store. That's where the irony starts, I suppose, when you need the chip to get a discount on a box of condoms, because you don't don't trust the chip on the patients.
I'd complain about a slippery slope, but it's much too late. That started when all you people had your dogs and cats chipped. Now it's just a matter of time. Shame on you for bringing about the end times. I hope Fluffy was worth it.
To prove that, when the antichrist shows up, I bet he gets a microchipped pet for his kids. Unless they are alergic, I suppose.
Educated don't Alienate (Score:5, Insightful)
The stigma associated with HIV/AIDS is so great in Indonesia that many people who are infected with the disease refuse to seek medical assistance because they are too ashamed - I know because I am Indonesian and have met such people.
What the Indonesian government needs to work on is to remove the stigma of HIV testing and the use of condoms and to educate people about the disease.
Threatening HIV positive people with a chip implant will achieve exactly the opposite and instead and will simply put HIV positive people into hiding and make it that much more difficult to educate these people about how the disease is transmitted - think about people who believe that having sex with virgins heals you of HIV or the South African minister who admitted to having sex with an HIV positive woman but took a shower afterwards to reduce chances of infection - these are the exact same people who need to be educated and not alienated
Re:Portable testing (Score:3, Insightful)
99% accuracy in a non-invasive, cheap test is quite enough for a screening test anywhere.
Genitalia??? Hell, tattoo it to their... (Score:1, Insightful)
...foreheads, not their foreskins. If an AIDS-infected person is being "sexually agressive", then everybody else around them deserves to be overtly warned about them.
Re:false sense of security (Score:3, Insightful)
They came first to implant those who had Aids/HIV,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't Aids/Hiv positive.
Then they came to implant the Protesters of forced implanting,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Protester.
Then they came to implant those who were less than average,
and I did not speak out for I was well educated.
Then they came for me,
and by that time no one was left to speak up that hadn't already been implanted.