Consider that throughout the world, one of the primary ways HIV has moved from high risk to low risk groups is via transportation networks. This has been documented in over 20 studies conducted all over the world. Accelerated transmission risk goes both ways-some drivers are unfaithful to their partners while on the road and when they get back home they unwittingly expose their partners to STI's and HIV. Some partners on the home front are unfaithful to their significant others who happen to be drivers. The reverse happens.
This isn't about blame or stigmatizing anyone. But it is a documented reality that has been found in international study after international study. (For reference Google the Synergy Study where many of these studies are cited in a joint effort between the University of Washington and the World Health Organization). There are very real and compelling reasons why risk taking occurs, and the numbers of drivers and their partners who have become infected continues to grow.
In North America, the situation is getting critical. I've spent several hours on the phone over the last several days talking to drivers who, with rising fuel prices, are reaching a breaking point. Several companies have shut their doors stranding drivers on the road. Other companies that continue to operate can't consistently make payroll. One driver I spoke to has lost his health insurance, his last several paychecks have bounced or "are in the mail". Even more troubling, he hasn't been able to take his HIV meds for over a month. When that happens, the virus that causes HIV builds resistances to his drug regiment. If somehow he were to pass HIV to another person, the recently infected party could potentially discover they are completely resistant to an entire class of antiviral drugs.
Driver health in general is also troubling. OSHA found that truck drivers have a 15 year reduced life expectancy over other occupations. In a NIOSH statistic from 2004, they found that drivers are eleven times more likely to die on the job than workers in other professions. In fact, truckers make up 15% of all on the job fatalities.
In Brazil a courageous Priest attempted to address the tragic working and health conditions truckers face. The stories are cited below.
Catholic Priest Antonio de Carli gets suited up, hooked in, in a tragic fundraising event to raise money for a trucker's health clinic.
All photo's courtesy of AP
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=561266&in_page_id=1811
So far, all that has been recovered from Antonio's brave fundraising effort are balloons floating in the ocean off the Brazilian Coast. It is feared that he has perished.
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