Overview

Carter Wilson discovers the legacy of AIDS in a country as poor as Mexico. He provides a dramatic personal account of the resilient citizens of Merida, the capital city of the Yucatan and principal city of the Mayan lowlands. His book explores the daily life of staff and patients at a clinic where three-quarters of HIV-positive people in the region are treated. Readers will come to know these patients - truck drivers, married couples, folk dancers, transvestites, a young woman infected by a blood transfusion during plastic surgery - who come from a wide range of social and economic backgrounds. Wilson recounts the heroic efforts of the clinic's staff as they struggle to treat their SIDA patients with only limited resources. Through the stories of these brave, caring staff members, readers will find real evidence against the common assumption that Third World medicine is a chamber of horrors. Wilson also explores the broader social context of AIDS in the Yucatan, from still-closeted homosexual men profoundly worried for their own survival and privacy, to the young men and women the crisis has moved to become activists.

Full Product Details

9780231101905

Table of Contents

Reviews

Wilson offers an engaging, fact-based portrait of individual Mexicans facing the consequences of AIDS in a clinic in the Yucatan; at the same time he explores the problems and potential consequences faces by medical personnel attempting to treat the disease.A well-informed portrait of sexual mores and homsexuality in provincial Mexico. -- Library Journal

"""Wilson offers an engaging, fact-based portrait of individual Mexicans facing the consequences of AIDS in a clinic in the Yucatan; at the same time he explores the problems and potential consequences faces by medical personnel attempting to treat the disease.A well-informed portrait of sexual mores and homsexuality in provincial Mexico."" -- Library Journal"

Author Information

Carter Wilson is professor of community studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available