Your daily Selection of IRIN Africa PlusNews reports, 12/3/2003

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U N I T E D N A T I O N S

Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

Integrated Regional Information Network

CONTENT:

1 - DRC: MONUC helping to break " vicious circle of fear " about HIV/AIDS

2 - RWANDA: US official pledges to mobilise resources in fight against

HIV/AIDS

3 - SOUTH AFRICA: Indian women struggling with HIV/AIDS and disclosure

1 - DRC: MONUC helping to break " vicious circle of fear " about HIV/AIDS

NAIROBI, 2 December (PLUSNEWS) - The UN Mission in the Democratic Republic

of the Congo, known as MONUC, is using all of its public information

mediums to broadcast HIV/AIDS awareness and " help break the vicious circle

of fear, prejudice and ignorance associated with the spread of the

disease " , the mission's head and Special Representative of the UN

Secretary-General in the country, Swing, said on Monday.

Swing made the remarks in an address to MONUC staff in the Congo,

according to a statement the mission issued to coincide with events

marking the World AIDS Day. He expressed concern about the spread of the

HIV/AIDS pandemic " that kills five people every minute of every day in the

world " .

MONUC reported that Swing regretted that adequate resources had not been

made available to counter the " awesome challenge " posed by HIV/AIDS.

In the Congo, Swing was quoted as saying, it might be several years until

the full impact of HIV/AIDS was revealed.

" A telltale sign of the impending crisis, however, is that patients

suffering from AIDS-related diseases occupy up to 50 percent of hospital

beds in the country, " he said.

He added that MONUC was using the UN Radio Okapi as well as regular

newsletters and magazines to broadcast HIV/AIDS awareness. The mission was

also striving to ensure that all of its personnel received preventive

information as part of their induction into the mission, and had access to

voluntary confidential counselling and testing.

HIV/AIDS had reversed development gains and undermined social and economic

prosperity as it had hit " every corner of the globe, infecting more than

42 million men, women and children, " MONUC quoted Swing as saying.

[ENDS]

2 - RWANDA: US official pledges to mobilise resources in fight against

HIV/AIDS

KIGALI, 3 December (PLUSNEWS) - US Secretary for Health and Human Services

Tommy promised on Wednesday to mobilise funds for HIV/AIDS

programmes in Rwanda and to secure antiretroviral (ARV) drugs for Rwandans

infected with the disease.

made the pledge in the Rwandan capital, Kigali. He was on the

second leg of a four-nation tour of Africa to assess HIV/AIDS projects and

to determine what needs to be done to increase treatment and prevent the

spread of the pandemic.

" We want to see what programmes are working and then fund those programmes

and be able to get anti-retroviral drugs to people that need them as soon

as possible, " he said after meeting Rwandan President Kagame.

Statistics from the Rwanda AIDS Control Programme indicate that at least

13 percent of Rwanda's 8.2 million people are infected with HIV/AIDS, yet

only a handful of them have access to ARVs.

said there was need for strong measures to combat mother-to-child

transmission of the virus that causes AIDS. " More importantly we have to

make sure that we get the programme up and running to reduce the

incidences of transfer of the virus from mother to child, " he said.

Rwanda has one of the highest number of orphans in sub-Saharan Africa as a

result of the HIV/AIDS pandemic as well as the 1994 genocide in which some

800,000 people died.

was accompanied by Holbrooke, the president of the Global

Business Coalition for HIV/AIDS, which is working to encourage companies

to contribute to the fight against the disease among their employees in

Africa and other developing nations.

Speaking after visiting a health centre in Gitarama, south of Kigali,

where HIV/AIDS patients receive treatment, said, " You and all

people in Africa are fighting a terrible scourge of HIV/AIDS. "

He added, " For too long this terrible disease has cut an ugly face

throughout this continent - and I am going back to America to do

everything I possibly can to help them and all the people of Rwanda - with

the many resources as we can possibly get in order to make sure more

people are taken care of. "

also said that the US government was planning to give Rwanda

technical aid to support the training of health workers and people caring

for HIV/AIDS patients.

[ENDS]

3 - SOUTH AFRICA: Indian women struggling with HIV/AIDS and disclosure

JOHANNESBURG, 2 December (PLUSNEWS) - Stigma and gender inequality are

helping to drive HIV/AIDS in South Africa's traditionally conservative

Indian communities.

Thirty-year-old Poppy Naicker is illiterate and barely able to make ends

meet. But poverty and her inability to write her own name are the least of

her concerns.

She is HIV-positive and has been laid low by opportunistic infections, but

is shunned by the Indian community of Chatsworth near the port city of

Durban, where she lives with her older sister and three teenage children

in a small overcrowded council flat.

One of just a handful of Indian women in the community willing to disclose

their HIV-positive status, Poppy told PlusNews she had contracted HIV from

a number of encounters with men who paid her for sex that was often

unprotected.

" It is difficult to refuse something if you are not sure of how good or

bad it really is. Now I know about the importance of condoms and how to

use them, but it is too late for me. If I knew then what I know now, I

would definitely have refused unprotected sex. "

Since her disclosure, her family has turned their backs on her and blame

her illness on " conduct unbecoming to an Indian woman " .

" Indian families always have a strong support for struggling members, but

more needs to be done about educating the families about HIV/AIDS and

making them speak more freely about the dangers of having the virus, and

how to avoid infection, " Poppy explained.

Savy Subramany, chief coordinator for the Chatsworth Community Care

Centre, one of the few AIDS NGOs operating there, said the stigma against

HIV/AIDS - that infection stemmed mainly from promiscuous sexual

behaviour - had stopped many people in the Indian community from

acknowledging their status.

Subramany said because a woman's morals and faithfulness were questioned

when she tried to negotiate safer sex, couples were still engaging in

unprotected sex, even when they suspected that one or both of them might

be HIV-positive.

" I have come across people who suffer silently without disclosing their

status, and without counselling or the appropriate care. Those who are not

willing to disclose often die slowly, alone and in agony, " Subramany

commented.

Gender-based inequality leaves all women - not just those from the Indian

community - more vulnerable to contracting HIV/AIDS because they are less

able to control how, when and where sex takes place.

Forty-five-year-old Nimmi Ramsarran found herself in this situation when

her husband, who often travelled for his work, suddenly became quite ill.

Nimmi said she suspected her husband might have contracted HIV during his

road trips, but was afraid to confront him about it - not out of fear of

her husband, whom she said she loved dearly, but rather out of her

commitment to him as a traditional Indian wife.

The couple continued to engage in unprotected sexual intercourse and it

was only when Nimmi's husband became worryingly ill that he decided to get

a full medical examination, including an HIV test.

Following her husband's HIV-positive result, the private clinic where the

tests were done advised Nimmi to be tested as well, but her result was

negative.

" It was only when I was referred to the Chatsworth Community Care Centre

for counselling that I met Savy, who spent many hours offering me the

support and education I needed to make it through to a second HIV test, "

she explained.

The period between tests was gruelling for Nimmi - apart from the fear of

discrimination, she also had to conceal the cause of her husband's death

when he died.

" With help from the centre I was able to hold on until the second HIV

test, which also turned out negative, and I have only recently overcome

the fear of community members discovering mine and my dead husband's

secret. "

Although she is a lot more confident that her third HIV test will also

turn out negative, she speaks anxiously about the episode and still refers

to HIV/AIDS as " that thing " .

The project manager for the University of Natal's Health Economics and

AIDS Research Division, Abrahams, says more needs to be done to

encourage people to speak openly about HIV/AIDS, and agrees that research

on individual households could also help to bring about a greater

understanding of the impact of HIV/AIDS on various cultural groups.

A recent study commissioned by former president Mandela through the

Human Sciences Research Council, claims to provide the most systematic and

comprehensive view available on how HIV/AIDS is affecting South Africans

according to race, gender, age and geographical location.

According to these findings, Indians make up 2.6 percent of the 46 million

South African population, but represent 1.6 percent of all HIV-positive

people.

Abrahams stressed: " I feel more could done in the way of advertising

campaigns, as the HIV/AIDS pandemic is also still largely regarded as a

white or black person's illness and recent advertising campaigns don't do

much to change that perception. It is difficult for someone of Indian ...

[heritage] to relate to the urgency of AIDS awareness and behavioural

change when you look at a billboard and see black or white or mixed race,

but no Indians. "

[ENDS]

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