A Disease Called Poverty: The Sickness Dismantling Global Health Equity

HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis (TB), and malaria are considered the “big three” infectious diseases in global health. These illnesses alone account for nearly 3 million deaths every year, ravaging communities and countries around the world (National Center for Biotechnology Information, 2021). While this number alone is staggering, it is even more notable to observe exactly who is getting sick from these diseases. 95% of all AIDS victims, 98% of the world’s TB cases, and over 90% of the deaths from Malaria occurred in developing countries (National Center for Biotechnology Information, 2021).