The Hindu : National : Suicides by HIV positive patients in Mumbai

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, May 03, 2005

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National

Suicides by HIV positive patients in Mumbai

Meena Menon

People feel there is a feeling of neglect

MUMBAI: : At around 7 a.m. on April 19, 28-year-old Sanjay (name changed) jumped off the fifth floor of the government-run J. J. hospital in South Mumbai. Sanjay had tested HIV positive two days earlier. Sources point out that no one noticed that he was missing from the ward where he had been admitted and added that he was lying unnoticed where he had fallen, for two hours.

Sanjay's was not the only suicide in J. J. hospital in April. The day after this incident, another HIV positive patient, who was admitted in the same ward with a respiratory infection, jumped off the fifth floor, injuring himself. He died soon after.

The day before Sanjay died, an unemployed sweeper who was HIV positive, had committed suicide in Mulund, a northeastern suburb of Mumbai. With three suicides that are HIV related in April, the focus is once again on the kind of services that are being provided to HIV positive people and the efforts that are being made to ensure they have the capacity to cope with their situation.

Apex institution

The National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) identifies J. J. Hospital as an apex institution for AIDS management. It is funding a range of services there, including an anti-retroviral (ARV) unit that treats people free. The hospital has experts in the field and also houses an autonomous AIDS Research and Control Centre (ARCON), specialising in counselling services. J. J. Hospital has been treating HIV positive cases since 1989. There are no exclusive wards for HIV positive people.

Dean of J. J. Hospital Pravin Shingare told The Hindu that Sanjay lay unnoticed for only 15 to 20 minutes. He clarified that his absence had been noticed in the ward and the staff had informed the police that the patient was absconding. He says there are two reasons for these suicides. People feel they will not be cured and there is a feeling of neglect. "There is a psychological breakdown; the brain is affected and they get suicidal," he says.

In this context, care and support services become crucial. The NACO supported anti-retroviral (ARV) unit at the J. J. hospital, treats people free of cost. There are about 1,600 people on ARV at the hospital already. It treats about 100 HIV positive people a day, of the total 1,300 out-patients.

Proposal

Manisha Sen, project director of ARCON, says that after the suicides, the centre was looking at a proposal to collate services with the hospital. "There is an acute lack of good counselling services. You need proper clinical psychologists, a unified approach and a team of people including a social worker, and a clinician as well," she said.

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