The Problem Isn’t Over

14 July 2010

The appeal came early and it was passionate and desperate. An in-law explained
how she had come to her husband’s village because his people had promised
help with her husband. His health had deteriorated so much that he was close to
the end when we finally got the diagnosis and he began to receive the ARVs that
stopped the decline but could not reverse the damage already done. That was in
early 2008.

Now the problem remains that she has to take him every 3 months over 300
kilometers by public transport to the southern region where he began his
treatment and which apparently is the only place where he can get the ARV
cocktail designed for his stage of the disease.

There are no machines for the C4 count in Kasungu so it is a 2 stage affair for
them. First they go for the C4 count in Lilongwe which is a 2 hour trip. Then they
have to return some time later and get the results and go to the southern region
for his medicine. He needs to be accompanied because he cannot travel alone
and the overcrowded minibuses cannot handle his wheelchair.

He is not alone. A sister is an AIDS widow with no visible means of support and
children and grandchildren to care for.

Another brother is healthy now and should be good for awhile because of his
healthy life style and the ARVs, but his daughter had reached stage 4 and now
is nearly blind. She had gone to Nkhoma to get her sight checked, but now she
needs help with lenses and lessons in Braille etc… She looks much healthier
now that she is on the ARV and seems to have reconciled herself to having to
live in the village now that her blindness forces her to depend on her family for
support, but she will be dependent for the rest of her life.

In aid circles, we tend to think of solving a problem and moving on to the next
issue. Over the last 2 years, we have put the AIDS issue on the table at Makupo
and made great strides, but the problem doesn’t stop there. It is still with us and
the consequences are still felt. The international community at the G8 and the
G20 barely spoke of these issues which had been such a priority when the likes
of Stephen Lewis and Bono had pushed them into the forefront even 5 to 7 years
ago.

The people with AIDS aren’t cured and don’t go away simply because some
money was thrown at the ‘problem’. They need much better service. The long
trips to the southern region are hard on both them and their long suffering
spouses. The lack of equipment for the most basic surveillance, the limited
range of medications and the inadequate delivery system still mean that many
people go undetected, unserviced and die. In Canada, HIV positive people have
a range of service that would boggle the mind of a carrier here. A fraction of that
would make a huge difference in the lives of millions of people condemned to the
forgotten backwaters of the poor rural areas of the world.