Introduction
In the discussion around the contraction of HIV, it is often said that these types of viruses judge people in a negative way. They also make people view the people contracted with HIV differently. From the perspective of many people in the late 1900’s, they thought that this contraction of HIV was only found in homosexuals and drug users. The perspectives of HIV disease has now changed from the late 1900’s.With the scientist researching the contraction of
HIV, they now know that is not found from certain people but sexually transmitted. Magic
Johnson a former NBA basketball player has created a new impact about the HIV disease and how people are treated and viewed with the contraction.
Summary of the Event:
On November 7, 1991, Magic Johnson a former NBA All Star that played for the L.A.
Lakers announced his contraction of HIV to the community and public at the age of 32. Magic
Johnson was one of the 5 major public known people to be contracted with HIV that causes
AIDS, He was also the first NBA Star to be contracted with HIV. After releasing to the public about his disease he then decided to retire. When the media first heard about Magics contraction of the virus, they were all astonished and confused. Since the HIV virus was still fairly new to everyone there was very minimal information about the disease itself . Many people started to formulate opinions about the disease and how it was only found in homosexuals and drug users. With Magic being married to Cookie Johnson and about to have their first kid, this raised a lot of questions on the disease and if he was going to die soon or still have a life in front of him. This was definitely a noteworthy as well as press worthy event because this helps find more clues to what this disease was really about and helped build a foundation that helped people suffering from the disease.
Causes and Effects
During the month of November in 1990, Magic Johnson got tested one day in his NBA
Career. This was when he found out that he was positive for the HIV virus. The HIV virus wasn't a very widely known virus. It was fairly new to many people. After being contracted with the disease they then tested his wife Cookie that was pregnant at the time with their first child. They told the family that Cookie was negative for the virus and that she would be okay. They also announced that Magic was going to survive with the disease and still live a long healthy life.
Magic didn't know much about the virus himself but after learning what the HIV virus was, he then later discovered that he got infected from unprotected heterosexual intercourse(Langer,
Zimmerman, Hendershot, and Singh 297). This was from having multiple sexual relationship when he was younger.
In the Aids Education and Prevention book Effect of Magic Johnson’s HIV Status on
HIVRelated Attitudes and Behaviors of an STD Clinic Population
, Lilly M. Langer, Rick S.
Zimmerman, Edward Hendershot and Mimi Singh writes, “On November 7, 1991 Earvin “Magic”
Johnson, one of the superstar of American basketball, announced that he has contracted the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes AIDS” (296). With being a major public figure this had made national news. It went viral in seconds and was talked about throughout the media. He was one of the first 5 major cases about the disease (Langer,
Zimmerman, Hendershot, and Singh 297). With Magic Johnson being a public figure and famous basketball player for the Lakers of Los Angeles,Ca, there was a lot of controversy on how he really got the virus and if he was gay, since the public viewed this as a “gay disease”
(Langer, Zimmerman, Hendershot, and Singh 296). This affected peoples views on him drastically. After knowing that he was contracted, he later decided to retire after playing for 3 years on the NBA. Many didn’t even want to touch him or even play against him in basketball
