2. Evidence of HIV Found in a Child Said to Be Cured

Until last year, thousands of children were shown to have been infected with H.I.V. (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) immediately after birth. Scientists have been attempting to discover a cure for this, but have failed for the past few years. However in March of 2013, there had been a report that a child from Long Beach who was infected with the virus at birth was supposedly cured after months of intensive treatment. This report brought hope to millions of doctors and patients around the world. Unfortunately, as Donald G. McNeil Jr. states in his article, this child who was apparently cure before appeared to show signs of infection caused by the virus. The pediatrician who was interviewed by Donald said that this deflating news was "like a punch in the gut." Then the author writes about the reactions of other doctors towards the unfortunate result of HIV not being a curable infection after all.

To make this article more effective, Donald McNeil makes the use of many different reliable sources and also the use of a previous report. The report that was sent out in March 2013 was a very crucial piece of evidence for McNeil's article. Without it, there would be nothing to compare the new report (evidence of HIV found in the child) with the old one (March 2013, when no traces of HIV was found in the child). The author also uses a lot of medical/ biological terms in order to describe the virus and how it is detrimental. By using these terms, McNeil makes his article an extremely reliable one. Towards the end of his article, the author gives examples of similar cases to this one- where patients infected with HIV were believed to have been cured. But parallel to what had happened with the child from Long Beach, all these reports ended being a "false alarm" and unfortunately, none of these patients were completely cured. The author then states that a continuous search for the cure is going on. And to end his article, McNeil introduces new information to the readers. He writes about how it is rare that children who are born to wealthy families are born with HIV. Since the mothers are able to afford paying multiple visits to the doctor's office and receiving tests constantly, they can identify if the child has been infected with HIV and can be put on triple therapy if it has been infected. This therapy helps mute the infection, and won't be a detrimental cause to the baby. He concludes saying that homeless and mentally ill women are those mothers who do not have access to prenatal care, and are the ones who have higher risks of having children who are infected with HIV. In other words, McNeil says that the child from Long Beach who was believed to have been cured from the diseases, came from a family who was not wealthy. The author abruptly ends his article there, making the readers (including myself to have many questions like: "If the child was truly from a non-wealthy family, how did they afford an extensive search for the virus in the baby?", "How did they pay for the extensive treatment that led scientists to believe that the baby was completely cured?", "Is this or is this not all a hoax?" and much more. By ending the article this way, Donald McNeil encourages readers to think, leaving a hint of skepticism,

[ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/11/health/signs-of-infection-seen-in-child-believed-to-have-been-cured-of-hiv.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=HpSum&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0 ]