District AIDS Coordination Committee (DACC) of Bajura has identified a total of seventy-two persons as HIV-positive in the district. The infected include 43 males and 29 females, and among them are some children. 

According to Dipak Bogati, coordinator for the DACC, 33 among the HIV patients range in the age from 30 to 39. Many of them are migrant workers back from foreign countries and their spouses. Bogati further said that many HIV-positive persons are from Dalit and ultra poor communities.

However, the DACC notes in its report that the actual figure of the patients with HIV could be much higher as many patients do not disclose the infection and prefer to seek treatment outside their district, DACC informed. 

Mina BK, president of Bajura Plus, a network of people living with HIV, expressed serious concerns over the plight of AIDS patients. She further said, “Soon after I listened to the plight of HIV patients, I approached the authority concerned. But they refused to listen to their problem.” 

Mina has been working for the welfare of people the people living with HIV-positive over the last four years. Some 14 years ago, her husband and later she herself was infected with HIV while they were in Mumbai, India. But she came to learn about hers and her husband´s infection only after he died because of the disease.

In the district, Mina claims that she was the first one to speak out about her infection. She has been taking antiretroviral therapy (ART) for a decade now. Out of her two children, 14-year-old son has been diagnosed HIV-positive but her daughter is safe. 

Health workers said that Nepali laborers migrating to India for employment are at the greater risk of being infected with HIV as they visit brothels there. When they come back, they transfer the AIDS virus to their spouses and children. Out of those infected, 29 women reported that the virus was transmitted to them by their husbands on their return from Indian cities. 

Maheshwari Sah, whose husband is infected, said, “Before my husband went to Mumbai, I had warned him of unsafe sexual contact but he didn´t listen to me.” She is safe, but still fears of transmission. Poor families who have a member living with HIV are pushed deeper into poverty as they spend huge amount of money on treatment. Such families cannot provide education their children and meet other basic needs of the family. 

Lack of education could be the main cause of such problem, HIV/AIDS activists say, as 80 percent of the infected are uneducated. Many children of the people living with HIV are deprived of basic education due to financial problems and social stigma, according to Juddha Rawal, an HIV/AIDS activist.

Published on: 3 June 2014 | Republica