The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Women's initiative to fight HIV stigma

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 01, 2007
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Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Women's initiative to fight HIV stigma

Staff Reporter

Focus on creating awareness at the grassroots

Thiruvananthapuram: Women living with HIV/AIDS in the State are coming together to launch an initiative to tackle issues of stigma and discrimination faced by HIV-positive men and women in their daily lives.

Fear of stigma and discrimination forces them to keep their condition a closely guarded secret. The veil of secrecy and doubt surrounding the disease, in turn, aggravates stigma and discrimination.

"This vicious circle cannot go on for ever. The situation will change only when Positive people show the courage to come out in the open to declare their Positive status and when society accepts the fact that HIV infection is a risk that anyone could be up against. Women are more vulnerable to the problems of discrimination than men, but they have decided to take the first step by pulling down the walls of secrecy around them," says P.B. Bindu, who heads the Kerala Positive Women's Network.

In a first-of-its kind initiative, sponsored by the Kerala State AIDS Control Society (KSACS), HIV-positive women will appear on public platforms to tell people about their status, how life has changed for them and how it can happen to anyone.

The project, `Tejaswini,' will focus on creating awareness of HIV at the grassroots-level through public forums where these women will be encouraged to speak about themselves. Minister for Health P.K. Sreemathy will inaugurate the programme at Karakulam panchayat on February 7.

Most of the Positive women are housewives who found themselves thrown out of their homes, disowned by their family and society when it came to be known that their husbands had died of HIV. People tend to tag morality issues with HIV and affected women have always been vulnerable to aspersions cast on their character. "We hope the project will help people perceive that HIV is like any other infection and thus bring down the stigma attached to it," an official of KSACS said.

Thirty HIV-positive women have now come forward to work with the project and more women are expected to come forward in the coming days. The women will work as three-member teams in all the panchayats in cooperation with local bodies. They will distribute posters and leaflets on HIV and the services that are available to Positive people.

The project is part of a policy decision of KSACS to focus more on taking HIV prevention and intervention programmes to the grassroots-level and organising structured programmes for reducing stigma and discrimination associated with HIV. It will be extended to all 900 panchayats in a phased manner.

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