Tamil Nadu - Madurai

Facing a three-pronged attack

Madurai: Inflation has hit people living with HIV/AIDS hard. “It is a three-way attack on an unarmed man,” feels P. Kumar, who is under the care of Family Planning Association of India (FPAI). Kumar (26) says, “Already we have suffered a double blow amidst relatives and friends in our prime and productive age in the form of discrimination and stigma that literally bog us down. The third weapon that pierces our hearts is price rise.” He was earning around Rs.2,000 a month which was not sufficient to run a family.

Now he finds it more difficult as he cannot even earn the same amount owing to his ill health. “But, price rise has not spared even my one-and-a half-year-old baby, whose milk intake has been reduced to 200 ml a day from 500 ml,” he says and adds that this 200 ml is made available with the help of his mother.

K. Krishnakanth of Pudukottai district says that he is forced to spend extra money on travel for collecting free anti-retroviral therapy tablets as he prefers to come to Madurai to get his medicines. As a farmer, he earns Rs.4,000 a month and spends Rs.700 on his children’s education and Rs.1,500 each on groceries and medicines for his opportunistic diseases.

“Life is so costly,” he says and adds that even the greens sold at Rs.1 now cost Rs.4 in his village. “When we buy, we need to spend at least Rs.10 on greens for the whole family.” “We live like dolls. We neither can work hard nor afford to eat a healthy food as directed by doctors, especially with this double digit inflation.” Working as an employee in a match unit, he earns about Rs. 4,000.

He spends Rs.80 on food every day and Rs.400 for his two children’s education.

“We are forced to spend a lot on travel as we want to maintain our secrecy,” he says and adds that free bus passes would help HIV-infected to some extent.

“Inflation has changed our lifestyle besides forcing us to cut down our three meals a day to two,” says B. V. Babu. He says that PLWHAs are similar to a husk of pulses that remains empty after the core content is eaten away by flies and insects.

Babu and his two children live on the earnings of his wife Nirmala Devi, who makes Rs.3000 a month as an outreach worker.

Of Rs.3000, rent takes Rs.500, education Rs.150 and food expenses around Rs.80 for an ordinary meal sans vegetables and fruits.

“Apart from all these expenses we badly need medical support for opportunistic infections such as tuberculosis, cold, dysentery and skin diseases which become part of our life. Though there are care centres and drop-in centres, all PLWHAs cannot afford to travel owing to both economic and physical conditions. They suffer by confining themselves to their homes and live witnessing their own death.”.

“Doctors say if you are on ARV treatment take four meals a day, but we have reduced the number of meals a day. We cannot also afford healthy and nutritious food,” says G. Alagendran, whose CD-4 count was just 13. Now he has improved his count to 373 by spending his income of Rs.4, 500 all on himself.

Controversies dominate the lives of PLWHAs, says S. Venkatachalam, project co-ordinator at AIDS Care Centre at Family Planning Association of India.

They lose their savings, job and normal way of living and have to live with stigma and discrimination.

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