Abstract
Introduction: If we speak of the three great killers in the first world (those countries with stable governments and relative affluence in comparison to the developing world), cancer, heart disease, and respiratory diseases (particularly if we include lung cancer) come to mind. In the developing world (third world), the three great killers are infectious diseases. The differentiation between first and third world have been obscured in many nations, where there is a mixture of mixture of problems, both the diseases of the affluent societies and those that have less developed medical systems. This review will focus on the three great killers afflicting sub-Saharan Africa: HIV, TB, and malaria.
Methodology: This manuscript is primarily a literature review of HIV, TB, and malaria using publicly available sources such as Google Search, PubMed and NIH reviews. When using personal experience, it is limited to East Africa, particularly Sudan and South Sudan, where the authors have their primary experience with these diseases.