ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how global health policies are a double-edged sword: On the one hand, they have prioritized AIDS care, allowing Malawi's antiretroviral therapy (ART) rollout to occur and saving countless lives. On the other hand, these policies often created by distant policymakers and thus, sometimes unsynchronized with conditions on the ground constrain the shape that AIDS care can take, with very real consequences for patients and providers. ART is delivered to poorest communities in the world, but, in some places, it is the only health service provided. In essence, the global hierarchies of emergency that emphasize AIDS while deemphasizing other conditions have not only placed HIV/AIDS patients in a social and medical echelon above patients with other health conditions, but it has neglected to provide HIV/AIDS patients with services critical to their care. Despite the indisputable progress seen in recent years, it is important to critically examine the processes by which global triage occurs and hierarchies of emergency are decided.
