Intervention at the UN High Level

            Comprehensive Review of Targets

   in Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS

                   May 31,2006 - 10 a.m.- 1 p.m.

             Alternate Intervention on Children and AIDS 

Mrs. Thandiwe Mathunjwa HIV/AIDS/TB Health Care Outreach Director Cabrini Ministries,

St. Philip's Catholic Mission, SWAZILAND

and delegate of UNANIMA International 

I am Mrs. Thandiwe Mathunjwa, the HIV/AIDS/TB Health Care Outreach Director in a dry rural area of Southern Africa. With 2 sisters and all staff from the local area we care for hundreds of orphaned children from the surrounding homesteads.

Some of our children are HIV positive, TB positive and some are already in treatment for AIDS...either from birth or from abuse.
 

Our Concerns are 1. Access   2. Sustainability 

Let me explain: The Anti-retroviral and TB drugs are available in our area and good programs are in place at our closest hospital -

 BUT....

• That hospital is about 70 km away from our area with 25-30 km of very bad, unpaved roads.

• There is no regulated transport system so that the cost is beyond what most people in our area can pay

• The unemployment rate in our area is 70-80%

• There is no clean water

 
With almost no infrastructure of employment, roads, clean water, irrigation, transport

THE ONE THING WE HAVE TO DEPEND ON IS THAT THE FUNDING FOR DRUGS WILL NOT DRY UP..

I ask you to commit yourselves as governments, World Bank and donor nations to make sure that funding for HIV and TB drugs does not dry up… that the children we need for the future of our countries are allowed to have a future.

I ask you to commit yourselves as governments, World Bank and donor nations to build the infrastructure of roads, transport systems, clean water and employment which are foundations for hope for the future of our children.

 From our experience - and we believe this to be true in many other countries of Africa, Latin America and Asia - particularly in rural areas - THREE major difficulties are

• Fear of not being able to continue treatment due to lack of free medicine for HIV and TB

• Lack of employment possibilities for sustaining life and hope...in this situation drinking and promiscuous sexual behavior increases

• lack of infrastructure like roads, clean water, irrigation systems and a fairly priced, regulated transportation system which allows reasonable access to what is available for our children as they grow.

We call on the World Bank, our governments and donor countries to make these needs high priorities in the planning to combat HIV/AIDS and TB.

We ask the governments to reflect on, act on, and sustain a plan which will bring about sustainability of access to needed medicines AND universal access to a life of productivity and nope through providing the basic infrastructure necessary for living a human life.

Thank you