Beating HIV/AIDS stigma and discrimination
by RYDER GABATHUSE, August 19, 2005, Mmegi News
FRANCISTOWN- After she was grounded by a long time illness, Mavis Banda was relieved last year when she finally knew the cause of her dwindling health. She was living with HIV/AIDS. Before she could overcome the shock of the discovery, another nightmare started.
She was stigmatised and discriminated. Before she knew her status, the now well-built 33-year-old Banda moved from one health facility to another without any hope of improvement.
“I was very sick and very thin. I could not do anything on my own.” Her immune system was seriously failing her. The source of her health problems was unravelled by Tebelopele Voluntary Testing and Counselling in February last year.
Little did she know that there was another mountain ahead of her to climb, just because of her HIV status. When she arrived home, she expected empathy from members of her family.
Instead, she was shocked when her grandmother rejected her outright after learning that she was HIV positive. “She told me never to set foot at her place because all her children were clean without the virus and I should not infect them”.
It pained me greatly, but I plucked enough courage to ignore this,” she told a quiet hall last Wednesday evening at the launch of the stigma and discrimination brochure by the District Multi - Sectoral AIDS Committee (DMSAC). When she made the pronouncement, all eyes were now set on her.
“I take it that I was lucky to have known my status which I fully accepted, as there was nothing else I could do.” She was shocked when she was told to vacate the place where she had lived with her grandmother for a long time, just because of her status. She saw the whole world collapsing on her.
“I told myself I should be strong enough to withstand the mounting pressure. I had won the first battle and could not lose this one. I knew a Good Samaritan somewhere will come to my rescue,” she declared cheerfully.
“As my grandma told me to vacate her place, I just told myself that God was watching me and would come up with a plan,” said the born again Banda - a resident of Kgaphamadi. Soon members of the Assemblies of God Church came to her rescue.
“I had informed them about my status and even the church pastors had accepted it.” She enrolled in the ARV programme after a delay because there was no one to sign the forms at the Infectious Disease Care Clinic (IDCC).
“There was no one to sign the adherence forms for me as my grandmother and my only hope was not on my side. A certain white woman called Susanne of TCM signed the forms for me to start on the life saving drugs. My experience pained them also, but they accepted it as part of life anyway.” As she made dashing and energetic moves on the podium, she thanked the ARVs and the positive attitudes of certain around her for giving her a new hope.
She had accepted her rejection as one of the things to live with. “You can’t force anyone to be on
your side at the time of need.” Her grandmother had accused her of contracting HIV/AIDS
because of promiscuity.
“I nearly died one Friday afternoon when I read from a local newspaper that had splashed the story of my sickness without my consent. My grandmother had just gone to this newspaper and they found it fit to say all those bad things about my status,” she said and added that it now dawned on her that she should get stronger and stronger.
“As we speak now, some of my grandmother’s children who tormented and discriminated me, because of my status are also infected.”
She remembers that her grandmother picked her clothes with a stick in fear that she would contract the virus. She said she was a complete outcast just like the Biblical lepers. “When all this was done to me, I told myself that one day, I would recover and live this life again.
Those who saw me then, do not accept that it is me,” she said shaking her body a bit.
Today, her grandmother sends people to her to apologise for her “bad treatment”. Banda says she would not take apologies from messengers.
“Whether she rejected me, I still consider her as my mother. I am still looking forward to a day we will meet cordially and inform her that I am not going to judge her harshly for what she did to me in the past. It is all behind me now.”
She is proud that she is today living a life with better direction, as she knows her status. She urged other people especially the youth to test and make viable future plans.
Source: Mmegi News at http://www.mmegi.bw/2005/August/Friday19/7818765651480.html
FRANCISTOWN- After she was grounded by a long time illness, Mavis Banda was relieved last year when she finally knew the cause of her dwindling health. She was living with HIV/AIDS. Before she could overcome the shock of the discovery, another nightmare started.
She was stigmatised and discriminated. Before she knew her status, the now well-built 33-year-old Banda moved from one health facility to another without any hope of improvement.
“I was very sick and very thin. I could not do anything on my own.” Her immune system was seriously failing her. The source of her health problems was unravelled by Tebelopele Voluntary Testing and Counselling in February last year.
Little did she know that there was another mountain ahead of her to climb, just because of her HIV status. When she arrived home, she expected empathy from members of her family.
Instead, she was shocked when her grandmother rejected her outright after learning that she was HIV positive. “She told me never to set foot at her place because all her children were clean without the virus and I should not infect them”.
It pained me greatly, but I plucked enough courage to ignore this,” she told a quiet hall last Wednesday evening at the launch of the stigma and discrimination brochure by the District Multi - Sectoral AIDS Committee (DMSAC). When she made the pronouncement, all eyes were now set on her.
“I take it that I was lucky to have known my status which I fully accepted, as there was nothing else I could do.” She was shocked when she was told to vacate the place where she had lived with her grandmother for a long time, just because of her status. She saw the whole world collapsing on her.
“I told myself I should be strong enough to withstand the mounting pressure. I had won the first battle and could not lose this one. I knew a Good Samaritan somewhere will come to my rescue,” she declared cheerfully.
“As my grandma told me to vacate her place, I just told myself that God was watching me and would come up with a plan,” said the born again Banda - a resident of Kgaphamadi. Soon members of the Assemblies of God Church came to her rescue.
“I had informed them about my status and even the church pastors had accepted it.” She enrolled in the ARV programme after a delay because there was no one to sign the forms at the Infectious Disease Care Clinic (IDCC).
“There was no one to sign the adherence forms for me as my grandmother and my only hope was not on my side. A certain white woman called Susanne of TCM signed the forms for me to start on the life saving drugs. My experience pained them also, but they accepted it as part of life anyway.” As she made dashing and energetic moves on the podium, she thanked the ARVs and the positive attitudes of certain around her for giving her a new hope.
She had accepted her rejection as one of the things to live with. “You can’t force anyone to be on
your side at the time of need.” Her grandmother had accused her of contracting HIV/AIDS
because of promiscuity.
“I nearly died one Friday afternoon when I read from a local newspaper that had splashed the story of my sickness without my consent. My grandmother had just gone to this newspaper and they found it fit to say all those bad things about my status,” she said and added that it now dawned on her that she should get stronger and stronger.
“As we speak now, some of my grandmother’s children who tormented and discriminated me, because of my status are also infected.”
She remembers that her grandmother picked her clothes with a stick in fear that she would contract the virus. She said she was a complete outcast just like the Biblical lepers. “When all this was done to me, I told myself that one day, I would recover and live this life again.
Those who saw me then, do not accept that it is me,” she said shaking her body a bit.
Today, her grandmother sends people to her to apologise for her “bad treatment”. Banda says she would not take apologies from messengers.
“Whether she rejected me, I still consider her as my mother. I am still looking forward to a day we will meet cordially and inform her that I am not going to judge her harshly for what she did to me in the past. It is all behind me now.”
She is proud that she is today living a life with better direction, as she knows her status. She urged other people especially the youth to test and make viable future plans.
Source: Mmegi News at http://www.mmegi.bw/2005/August/Friday19/7818765651480.html
posted by AIDS-Care-Watch at 9:56 am
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