“No child should be born with HIV; no child should be an orphan
because of HIV; no child should die due to lack of access to treatment.”
This famous 2010 quote by Ebube
Sylvia Taylor, an 11-year-old Nigerian born free of HIV, speaks volumes. It was
made during a meeting of world leaders in New York to share progress towards
the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, by 2015.
Today, the
national plans for eliminating new HIV infections among infants and keeping
their mothers alive are being entrenched. Mothers and their babies in Africa
and the world at large are having greater access to optimal HIV prevention and
treatment regimens based on latest guidelines.
Such is the story of Lillian Garile.
Fourteen years after she got married to the love of her life, she became the
proud mother of a healthy baby girl. It was a long wait but Lillian says it
was worthwhile.
The 33-year-old child-minder who
discovered she was living with HIV quite by accident few years back, has,
however, made the best of what could be described as a bad situation.
The elder of two sisters, Lillian
lost her parents at a tender age and had to look out for herself and younger
sister.
During an encounter at the
Witkoppen Health and Welfare Centre in Sandton, Johannesburg, South
Africa, Lillian, who hails from Zimbabwe, was initially downcast about the HIV
positive diagnosis. Nevertheless, the woman whose mother was of South African
descent, summoned courage and battled the odds to become mother of a healthy
HIV-free baby.
Lillian is one of the several
millions of Africans struggling to cope with the demands of low economic status
and high incidence of HIV/AIDS among other challenges.
All the years she waited to have her
own baby, Lillian never lost hope. She benefited from the Safer Conception
Clinic initiative of the Witkoppen Centre and her baby is among the first set
of babies to be delivered there although not the first to be conceived.
“I love children. I look after
children for a living.
Even though I have just one
biological child of my own, I can say I have many children because I look after
so many of them. I have been doing so for almost eight years,” she remarked.
Witkoppen is an NGO operating at grassroots level to provide preventive and
curative to deal with the social determinants of disease and decrease the high
maternal and newborn mortality in the country. “I was registered for antenatal
at 16 weeks. I come here for post natal services although.
It’s a distance from
the hospital to where I stay, but I choose to come here even though it
cost me about 22 Rands by taxi.
“I’ve decided to stay at home and
look after my daughter until she is at least one year old.
Certainly I
would love to go back to looking after children again because that is my first
love—children. I was trained professionally to look after them. For now, my
husband takes care of all my needs.” Before the birth of her baby, Lillian had
an ectopic pregnancy.
“It was traumatic. I had a surgery afterwards and the
doctors told me that now I had only one Fallopian tube. But I was assured it
was still enough for me to have all the babies I wish to have.” Five months
later her wish came true when she became pregnant again.
“I love this hospital.
I love the staff that I have met here. I chose this because of the skills
available here especially since Ai had the experience with the ectopic. A
neighbour recommended this place and it’s been wonderful.”
Lillian is usually up by 4 am to get
herself and baby ready so as to be at the clinic by 5am. “There is usually a
long queue and even though I get here early, it’s common to find several people
already waiting.
We often stay for some time because we need to see many
healthcare providers one after the other. Things like family planning and other
care issues are taken care of. Although on ARVs, Lillian is not planning to
have more babies. “I’ve had enough. I’m satisfied with just one. She is healthy
and that is all I ask for,” she noted.
Indeed, the world has an
unprecedented opportunity to make new HIV infections among
children become history. In 2009,
370 000 children became newly infected with HIV globally and an estimated 42
000 – 60 000 pregnant women died because of HIV.
In contrast, in high-income
countries the number of new HIV infections among children and maternal and
child deaths due to HIV was virtually zero. In low and middle-income countries,
still too few women are receiving HIV prevention and treatment services to
protect themselves or their children.
In the bid to change this inequity,
stopping new HIV infections among children and keeping their mothers alive is a
task to be done.
There is global consensus that the
world must strive towards elimination of new HIV
infections among children by 2015
and keep mothers and children living with HIV alive.
Many low and middle-income countries
have already moved significantly towards
achieving these goals. Lillian and
her baby are the evidence of this march towards “getting to Zero” strategy. It
outlines a global effort to reach the “three zeros” of HIV/AIDS — zero new
deaths, zero new infections, and zero discrimination.
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