A recent gathering of persons living with HIV shared their “deepest emotional pain” over stigma and called for recognition of their diversity and the establishment by the government of a desk at which they can lodge complaints.
At a briefing on the forum, Chief Executive Officer of the Caribbean Family Planning Affiliation Ltd (CEPA), Dr Tirbani Jagdeo pointed out that anti-retrovirals (ARVs) had ironically fuelled stigma and discrimination.
He pointed out that before ARVs the fatality ratio of persons living with the virus was seven out of ten but now with the treatment there are larger numbers of persons in different countries living with HIV and AIDS and this has seen stigma and discrimination on the increase.
He pointed out that the two are “essential drivers” of the epidemic because the more people feel stigmatized by uninfected persons, the more likely they are not going to get themselves tested and would deny that they are infected.
Speaking following the three-day workshop on stigma and discrimination for persons living with the virus, Dr Jagdeo said if HIV and AIDS are to be addressed properly in the Caribbean more effort must be placed on stigma and discrimination.
To this end, Dr Jagdeo said he has committed funds to this issue from money given to his organisation by the Canadian International Deve-lopment Agency (CIDA) to the workshop, which was held at Regency Hotel between August 26 and 28 and saw 25 persons living with the virus participating.
He said during the workshop, held under the theme ‘Stigma and Discrimination: drivers of the HIV epidemic’, the participants shared their “deepest emotional pain with us” and advised on what should be done in the future.
Infected persons
At the end of the workshop a statement was formulated and this was shared with the media during the interaction with Dr Jagdeo at the Guyana Responsible Parenthood Association (GRPA).
And one of the burning hopes of the participants was for strategies to reach out to their population and “explicitly recognize that we are an internally diverse population with respect to age, gender, socio-economic status, sexual orientation, life styles and the degree of high risk behaviour that exposed us to the virus.”
They also want programmes and policies to be sensitive to their internal diversity since it is critical to their relevance and effectiveness in reducing the spread of the virus.
Further, in the statement the infected persons pointed out that they are more than people infected with HIV and their infection does not define them.
“We are men and women with the capacity to contribute productivity to all aspects of society and are entitled to the respect and rights granted to all productive members of society,” they said. And such rights include the right to work, access to education, training and health care, freedom from insults, physical abuse and any form of discrimination issuing from their HIV status.
They also urged that all initiatives should take into “explicit account the rights of women based on the principles of gender equity and equality.”
Meanwhile, the participants called on the government to provide leadership through “legislation and policies in addressing the continuing discrimination against [infected persons] in the workplace, to strengthen the ability of all persons within the health care sector and to provide respectful, confidential and private services to [them] and ensure free and full access to education, training, housing, other social services and insurance for [themselves and their children].”
Seeking redress
They also want the government to set up a desk charged with special responsibilities for investigating reported violations of the laws and policies and with the authority to seek redress for any proven violations of their rights.
And members of civil society were asked to raise their voices in public support for the call for policies and legislation to end stigma and discrimination against infected persons. They were also asked to join with the people living with the virus in the network of associations to act as a watchdog for the protection of the rights of those persons at all levels of society.
Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) were asked to collaborate with the National AIDS Programme Secretariat (NAPS) on the production of a directory of services covering essential social services, inclusive of educational, health, counselling and gender-based violence.
The participants recognised that they have special roles to play in the fight against stigma and discrimination and to this end they called on the organizations of people living with the virus to develop material for conducting training aimed at preparing infected persons for the challenges of dealing with the public and working with individual groups.
They also want them to facilitate training sessions for healthcare professionals in the refinement and use of pre-and-post-counselling protocols for people living with the virus with special attention to aspects of privacy, confidentiality and respect that are important to the infected persons.
Further, those organisations are asked to counsel and assist persons in testing centres who are desirous of getting HIV tests and giving advice on sensitive matters such as
disclosure, the need for care and support and the value of seeking treatment.
And they should also develop material for conducting training aimed at preparing infected persons to serve as mentors within their community.
Outreach work must also be conducted in the communities based on documented personal testimonials to the value of care, treatment and support and to discuss the complex issues having to do with HIV prevention, testing, disclosure and safe sex.
And finally, the organisations are asked to train the infected persons in educating families, young people in and out of school and the community in matters related to HIV transmission, prevention, testing and disclosure.
Dr Jagdeo said that the statement would be circulated to the Ministry of Health, regional, faith-based and international organizations, among others.
“We think that this statement that they have given us gives us guidance about where to go in the future.”
Dynamics of infection
Dr Jagdeo said further that the HIV/AIDS epidemic has been a “rapidly” changing one and it has been a “dynamic” epidemic with “regards to who gets infected with the virus and the manner of transmission.” He recalled that in the early days the virus was viewed as one for homosexuals but it very rapidly transformed into a heterosexual disease affecting men who have sex with women.
“The ratio in the middle eighties of the number of men who were infected compared to women was about three to one. That was not to last - about ten to twelve years after that ratio has been established the ratio began to change where more and more women became infected. So today in most Caribbean countries the ratio between male and female infections is about one to one,” Dr Jagdeo stated. He observed too that women are now even with men on the infection scale because many of them became infected through unfaithful male partners.
Continuing to illustrate the dynamics of the infection, Dr Jagdeo stated that at one time it was believed that the older men and women got infected but today in the Caribbean “the group of people who are being infected faster are young men and women and mostly young women.
So the dynamics has changed quite a bit. . .“ And the dynamics, he added, does not only apply to who gets infected but also the manner of transmission since in some parts of the world people get infected mostly from drug use while in other cases it is sexual.
Quote :”And members of civil society were asked to raise their voices in public support for the call for policies and legislation to end stigma and discrimination against infected persons”
Agreed.
GHRA? answer the call and help these people.!
Given prevailing attitudes among Guyanese, these people do have a lot of
problems to overcome; Their families and friends have to show compassion
in the first instance and that in itself is the number one problem. Too many
are shunned and all too soon their condition becomes public knowledge.
Hopefully the Government rises to the issue and have some fair treatment
measures implemented soon.
I DO NOT support ppl living with aids. They are only living longer to further infect other persons who don’t know about their status.Infact i think they should pass a law jailing anyone who knowingly infect another person.
bung bang you are a very ignorant person to make such statement.
We have such a law in Canada and in fact quite a few prosecutions have
been done.
Passing such a law, that is if there is none in Guyana, should take a matter
of days. All the readings could be done in one day.
To knowingly infect another has to be a criminal offence.
When the former girl friend of a friend of mine was dying in hospital, she
sent to call him to come and see her. Imagine his shock to hear from
her that she was dying of AIDS ! She told him to go check himself which
he did. He died two years later and so too his wife !
Here in Canada, the auhorities request patients to give a list of past
contacts which they follow up discreetly. That would be a problem in Guyana,
the need for being discreet and to respect privacy.
I think you put this comment just to make people angry ,because there is no way someone could be insensitive and cruel.you ought to be ashame of yourself lets hope you or your loveone do not ever contact the virus ,then you would get to decide , and never say never, and let me clear something up for you and NO I AM NOT HIV POSITIVE AND I DO NOT HAVE AIDS.
Bung bung, when I hear such utterances from you I get extremely mad but I realise it does me or you no good. One good thing you said, knowingly infecting someone should be criminal, the others are just crap coming out of the mouth of a seeming heartless person. Not everyone infected is a walking time bomb. If you are going to abitrarily condemn people with HIV, why stop there? Get the rest with othe rinfectious illnesses and they must share the fate.
Some of the comments here are the reason HIV is a fatal disease.
Out of ignorance so many see AIDS as fatal, whereas it is now a chronic illness, similar to Cancer.
God forbid some of these ignoramuses do not contract it, because then they shall know the need for sensitivity and compassion.
many people who are infected with the virus choose to spread the disease.
We’re all aware of the different ways of contracting it.
One of my siblings who contracted the virus some time in 80’s, discovered her status when the father of her unborn took ill and died. She choose a deadly path of infecting hundreds of men from the churches to the street corners, before succumbing in 1994.
Another sibling discovered her status in the mid 90’s when the promiscuos man she was having an affair with took ill and died a week later. Sadly she’s spreading her sorrow form the interior to Georgetown, with the young and the old. I don’t understand how men aren’t suspicious. I’m told there are many tell tale signs of her being a carrier.
Last year I met a group of American women in a program for recovering drug addicts living with the virus They lived in the same apartment complex where I resided. To make a long story short, they appeared healthy. One of my neighbors became involved in a lesbian relationship with one of the women. I brought it to the attention of someone in authority who warned her without being too blatant. It fell on deaf ears.
I knew another woman who constantly kissed her friend’s three month old son in the mouth while baby sitting him. After learning that she was HIV positive and had Hepatisis c, I informed the mother of the child…………… The end result.
I was deemed as spreading rumors.
It’s a good thing thats ur opinion about me but wat u should do is see if wat i’m saying makes sense or not or infact if wat i said is factual in life remember is humans we are dealing with and there’s that mind set “somebody give me suh me a give back some body”….BUNG BANG!