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| Sunday, 11 December 2005 |
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Features |  |
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HIV victims - social outcasts What do you call a man or a woman who takes the life of another? 'Murderer' may be a word that may come to your mind. And yet, the term is for only those acts of killing, by violent means.
by Vimukthi Fernando The family was ridiculed and tormented so much, so that their two school-going teenagers had to stop their schooling. "The wife was given poison into her hand in order to give it to her husband and put an end to his life. After this whole ordeal, the husband could not deal with the suffering that the family was going through and he committed suicide. After the husband's death, while the wife and the two children were sleeping, the villagers set fire to the house. But the family managed to run to safety. Since then, they had not visited their home." A prelude to the latest thriller in the big screen? An introduction to a detective novel? None whatsoever. This incident happened in a hamlet of the very country we live in - the country which we are proud to introduce to others as multi-cultural, multi-religious, tolerant, hospitable and therefore where one can live harmoniously. "No person shall be punished with death or imprisonment except by order of a competent Court, made in accordance with procedure established by the Law....," says Article 12 (4) of the Sri Lankan Constitution. And yet, this was how, a whole village planned to eliminate a family. Their crime? The head of the family tested HIV positive. Fortunately, the family escaped to safety and lived to relate their gruesome tale to a research team of the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA), in their quest to develop 'A profile of the Stigma and Discrimination faced by people living with HIV/AIDS for the Asia Pacific Leadership Forum (APLF). The study carried out in two main cities and suburbs reveal the inhuman treatment meted out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS by the Sri Lankan society. Stigma HIV/AIDS: What makes it such a dreadful situation? It is because, "Individuals living with HIV are often believed to deserve their HIV positive status as a result of having done something 'wrong'," says the UNAIDS Case Studies book on HIV - Related Stigma, Discrimination and Human Rights Violations. The notion is that HIV/AIDS is a disease among a few group of people who may deviate from the more accepted behavioral patterns of the society - women and men who sell sex, men who have sex with other men and those who inject drugs, says the study report. However, this is hardly the case when it comes to reality. But the moment the society realises that a person is HIV positive or suffering from AIDS it tends to treat him or her differently. The care givers at the hospitals turn monsters who scold the individuals for acquiring the disease, shun them, spread the fact that he or she suffers from the disease to everyone including the family and villagers if possible, treat them like show pieces, animals in a zoo to be looked at and sympathised by visitors of other patients and sometimes even refuse to treat them, reveals the report. "The doctors... told everyone who came to see him that day that he was HIV. The thing is, he was moved from the bed to the ground, and on enquiry from the family were told by the doctors that he was HIV, we don't generally keep AIDS patients," is how the study records a single instance of such discrimination. It is not only the health sector which discriminates persons infected with HIV/AIDS and members of their families. They are thrown out of their jobs, houses they live in, children are prevented from schooling, spouses advised to go for divorce, thus ostracised by society at all levels. Medical negligence These bring us to the question of rights. For we know that humans have their rights - right to life, shelter, education, food, medication and many more. In Sri Lanka, the Constitution clearly explains Fundamental Rights as non discrimination: "on the grounds of race, religion, language, caste, sex, political opinion, place of birth or any such grounds." And yet, society stands on a higher pedestal. Communities drive those identified as HIV positive to take their lives. They marginalise them, without proper treatment, so they die from opportunistic diseases. Or in extreme cases, they take the law into their hands - burn down houses trying to kill the people. Citizenship All because, a person suffers from a disease, does he or she cease to be a human being ? Does he or she automatically lose the citizenship of Sri Lanka? May be he or she has been engaging in risky behaviour. But, aren't there others amidst us who do the same? It is not only those who are engaged in risky behaviours described above who are susceptible to HIV/AIDS. Medical negligence too had led to many cases of HIV/AIDS in Sri Lanka, like in other western countries. Furthermore, whereas open discussion of the disease may help people to reveal themselves to curb infection and spread of the disease, the stigma and discrimination drives people towards non-declaration, or ignorance of a person's HIV status. In a country like ours where extramarital and premarital sex seems to be the undercurrent of the society, where quacks could be found dime a dozen and where even licensed doctors practise do stop to various ways and means of cutting down costs - the consequences would be difficult to face unless we take a realistic viewpoint of the disease. |
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However, there are other forms of 'murder' as well. Euthanasia, the act
of mercy-killing or medically aided suicide is still debated over the world.
And yet, Sri Lankan society is murdering some of their own members - by
refusing to recognise that they are part of their society, by stigmatising
and discriminating them, by preventing them from finding out whether they
are suffering from a disease or not, by preventing them access to proper
medication, by preventing them leading normal lives - the findings of a
study revealed to the media last week. 
