India: Anguished young voices
by, NITIN JUGRAN BAHUGUNA, The Hindu, July 2, 2006
Sixty children affected by HIV from all over India get together to express their views and demands.
India: WITH the cheerfulness that characterises children, they fantasise about glory and wealth, saving lives as doctors, designing high-rise buildings as architects, seeing the world as pilots or spreading awareness as teachers.
But these children have other, more urgent, demands too — "I want to have a lot of good food"; "I want my mother always healthy"; "I want good orphanage homes to be opened in different places for HIV-affected children"; "I need to earn money for my younger sister's education"; "I want a good education"; "We need good counsellors and regular treatment". These are just some of the yearnings of children affected and infected with HIV/AIDS across India.
At the recent "National Consultation for Children Affected by HIV/AIDS" — the first of its kind — about 60 children from across the country gathered in Manesar, Haryana, to voice their views, concerns and feelings vis-à-vis their proximity to a disease that continues to strike terror in the community at large. The predominant feeling among them was a sense of isolation from the community, stigma and discrimination at schools, and lack of good, nutritious food and child-friendly medical services in hospitals.
"Why are we not getting seats in good schools?"; "Why are we not getting treatment like normal children?"; "Why are we thrown out from society?"; "Why are they separating us from our family? Why can't we live with our brothers and sisters?" These and many more anguished queries came from the young but articulate gathering.
Similar experiences
"I am an orphan", says Chingkheihunbi, 12, of Manipur matter-of-factly. By now, she has become inured to the loathing meted out to her by her uncle with whom she stays and just tunes out his verbal lashings. "My aunt, who is my father's sister, is kind to me, but my uncle is always scolding me," she says with a shrug. Her objective is to escape her present surroundings and put as much distance as possible between her uncle and herself. "I am studying in class VI. I hope to become a doctor one day," she vows.
Murugesh, 16, of Bangalore, remembers his uncle taking him away from his native Surynalli village near the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border and placing him in an orphanage after his parents died. At the orphanage, he began to get severe headaches and fever. "After a blood check, it was discovered that I was HIV+. Soon afterwards, the orphanage threw me out," he says.
He had his first stroke of luck two years later in 1999, when a Bangalore-based NGO learnt of his plight and offered him a home. At Freedom Foundation, an organisation providing medical and other livelihood support to People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA), Murugesh got another chance at life. "They enabled me to enrol in a school here and I am now studying in class IX," he says proudly.
But the new life is not without its challenges. "Only my teachers and the Principal know of my HIV status. I'm scared to tell my friends in case their parents protest and force me to leave school."
But the lad believes in a positive approach, his hope strengthened by the astonishing care and support given to him by his teachers. His deepest desire now is to study law. "I want to fight for the rights of HIV+ people. I also dream of going abroad for higher studies," he confesses with a smile.
Having a say in policy
The four-day workshop from May 24 to 27 was organised by the Positive Women Network (PWN+), headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Children from the States of Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Manipur, Nagaland, Orissa and Tamil Nadu attended.
P Kousalya, PWN+ President, describes the network as an organisation affiliated to the Indian Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (INP+). It has been exclusively working with women affected by HIV/AIDS over the past eight years and with children for two years, she informs.
According to Kousalya, the purpose of the consultation was to "hear the voices of children directly affected and infected by HIV/AIDS", and get from them suggestions and recommendations for their welfare. Children affected by HIV are major stakeholders in any debate on HIV policy and so their voices must be heard, she stresses.
"We have forwarded the children's recommendations to the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO). We hope they will find a presence in the third phase of the Government's National AIDS Control Programme, called NACP III, which is in the process of being finalised," Kousalya adds.
The issues surrounding children orphaned or made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS have been highlighted at two Special Sessions of the UN General Assembly — one on HIV/AIDS in June 2001 and the other on Children in May 2002. According to UNICEF's latest yearly child update,
"The State of the World's Children 2005", every day about 1,700 children are infected with HIV. There are an estimated 2.1 million children worldwide under 15 years currently living with HIV, it says.
Preventing HIV infection in women of reproductive age is the most effective way of decreasing the number of young children infected with HIV. But, as the report points out, in the absence of antiretroviral (ARV) drug prophylaxis for pregnant women (literally, preventive treatment; here, short-term ARV treatment for pregnant women), the estimated rates of mother-to-child HIV transmission in developing countries range from 25 to 45 per cent.
Providing ARV prophylaxis to pregnant women and to babies at birth can reduce the risk of transmission by half, the UNICEF report adds.
Urgent needs
Strong on the list of the 60 children converging here was to make available testing facilities as well as treatment and drugs for all opportunistic infections (infections due to reduced immunity caused by HIV infection, like tuberculosis or bacterial infections). They also called for child-friendly hospitals with sensitised medical personnel and child counsellors.
Other significant recommendations proposed by the children are: the need for children's support groups to be established at the district level, facilitated by positive women's groups; a revisit and re-designing of the existing guidelines for counselling to address needs of children affected by HIV; linkages for parents of affected children with the Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme; schemes for homeless women; vocational training for girl children and various other support schemes; and the setting up of an expert committee to monitor the quality of facilities for orphaned children.
Courtesy: Women's Feature Service
Source: The Hindu
Sixty children affected by HIV from all over India get together to express their views and demands.
India: WITH the cheerfulness that characterises children, they fantasise about glory and wealth, saving lives as doctors, designing high-rise buildings as architects, seeing the world as pilots or spreading awareness as teachers.
But these children have other, more urgent, demands too — "I want to have a lot of good food"; "I want my mother always healthy"; "I want good orphanage homes to be opened in different places for HIV-affected children"; "I need to earn money for my younger sister's education"; "I want a good education"; "We need good counsellors and regular treatment". These are just some of the yearnings of children affected and infected with HIV/AIDS across India.
At the recent "National Consultation for Children Affected by HIV/AIDS" — the first of its kind — about 60 children from across the country gathered in Manesar, Haryana, to voice their views, concerns and feelings vis-à-vis their proximity to a disease that continues to strike terror in the community at large. The predominant feeling among them was a sense of isolation from the community, stigma and discrimination at schools, and lack of good, nutritious food and child-friendly medical services in hospitals.
"Why are we not getting seats in good schools?"; "Why are we not getting treatment like normal children?"; "Why are we thrown out from society?"; "Why are they separating us from our family? Why can't we live with our brothers and sisters?" These and many more anguished queries came from the young but articulate gathering.
Similar experiences
"I am an orphan", says Chingkheihunbi, 12, of Manipur matter-of-factly. By now, she has become inured to the loathing meted out to her by her uncle with whom she stays and just tunes out his verbal lashings. "My aunt, who is my father's sister, is kind to me, but my uncle is always scolding me," she says with a shrug. Her objective is to escape her present surroundings and put as much distance as possible between her uncle and herself. "I am studying in class VI. I hope to become a doctor one day," she vows.
Murugesh, 16, of Bangalore, remembers his uncle taking him away from his native Surynalli village near the Kerala-Tamil Nadu border and placing him in an orphanage after his parents died. At the orphanage, he began to get severe headaches and fever. "After a blood check, it was discovered that I was HIV+. Soon afterwards, the orphanage threw me out," he says.
He had his first stroke of luck two years later in 1999, when a Bangalore-based NGO learnt of his plight and offered him a home. At Freedom Foundation, an organisation providing medical and other livelihood support to People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA), Murugesh got another chance at life. "They enabled me to enrol in a school here and I am now studying in class IX," he says proudly.
But the new life is not without its challenges. "Only my teachers and the Principal know of my HIV status. I'm scared to tell my friends in case their parents protest and force me to leave school."
But the lad believes in a positive approach, his hope strengthened by the astonishing care and support given to him by his teachers. His deepest desire now is to study law. "I want to fight for the rights of HIV+ people. I also dream of going abroad for higher studies," he confesses with a smile.
Having a say in policy
The four-day workshop from May 24 to 27 was organised by the Positive Women Network (PWN+), headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Children from the States of Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Manipur, Nagaland, Orissa and Tamil Nadu attended.
P Kousalya, PWN+ President, describes the network as an organisation affiliated to the Indian Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (INP+). It has been exclusively working with women affected by HIV/AIDS over the past eight years and with children for two years, she informs.
According to Kousalya, the purpose of the consultation was to "hear the voices of children directly affected and infected by HIV/AIDS", and get from them suggestions and recommendations for their welfare. Children affected by HIV are major stakeholders in any debate on HIV policy and so their voices must be heard, she stresses.
"We have forwarded the children's recommendations to the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO). We hope they will find a presence in the third phase of the Government's National AIDS Control Programme, called NACP III, which is in the process of being finalised," Kousalya adds.
The issues surrounding children orphaned or made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS have been highlighted at two Special Sessions of the UN General Assembly — one on HIV/AIDS in June 2001 and the other on Children in May 2002. According to UNICEF's latest yearly child update,
"The State of the World's Children 2005", every day about 1,700 children are infected with HIV. There are an estimated 2.1 million children worldwide under 15 years currently living with HIV, it says.
Preventing HIV infection in women of reproductive age is the most effective way of decreasing the number of young children infected with HIV. But, as the report points out, in the absence of antiretroviral (ARV) drug prophylaxis for pregnant women (literally, preventive treatment; here, short-term ARV treatment for pregnant women), the estimated rates of mother-to-child HIV transmission in developing countries range from 25 to 45 per cent.
Providing ARV prophylaxis to pregnant women and to babies at birth can reduce the risk of transmission by half, the UNICEF report adds.
Urgent needs
Strong on the list of the 60 children converging here was to make available testing facilities as well as treatment and drugs for all opportunistic infections (infections due to reduced immunity caused by HIV infection, like tuberculosis or bacterial infections). They also called for child-friendly hospitals with sensitised medical personnel and child counsellors.
Other significant recommendations proposed by the children are: the need for children's support groups to be established at the district level, facilitated by positive women's groups; a revisit and re-designing of the existing guidelines for counselling to address needs of children affected by HIV; linkages for parents of affected children with the Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme; schemes for homeless women; vocational training for girl children and various other support schemes; and the setting up of an expert committee to monitor the quality of facilities for orphaned children.
Courtesy: Women's Feature Service
Source: The Hindu
posted by AIDS-Care-Watch at 8:12 am
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