Family agrees to air their story of HIV/AIDS on TV
We hear about HIV/AIDS in public awareness campaigns, but we seldom hear about it from the people who are actually suffering, or whose loved ones are infected. This is not surprising, considering that some people in Belize still shun anyone they think has AIDS. In 2001 News 5’s Janelle Chanona did a series of interviews on AIDS in Belize as part of her Masters’ Degree programme in the U.K. Rodel Beltran Perera of the Alliance Against AIDS helped her locate a family that was willing to talk, on the condition that the video would not be aired in Belize, since they had not even told their families about their condition. They have finally agreed to let us share their story with you here at home, even though they have not broken their silence completely and still have not informed their families out of fear. We hope you will listen to what they have to say and discuss the problem of HIV/AIDS with your own family, or reach out to someone you know that may be suffering in silence.
Janelle Chanona
The latest national statistics reveal that every week three people die from AIDS in Belize. This is the story of one woman who has infected almost every member of her family, including two of her children, with the deadly disease.
“Michelle”
“It’s been very hard, and it’s my whole family. It’s a family of five…but the in-between child…it’s three child and two adult, the in-between child is negative, but the baby and the oldest are positive.”
This twenty-six year old woman and her husband have asked to remain anonymous because they are terrified of how their families, and society in general, would react to the news that they are HIV positive.
Janelle Chanona
“You think even your family would treat you bad?”
“Michelle/Michael”
“Of course. Exactly.”
“Michael”
“People feel that they can ketch it from any angle. They noh care whether scientific said that it will only be through sexual transmitted. They just feel like if you touch me, that’s it. People still noh get the sense about it on trust that that is true, because scientists could come back later and tell you something else. Then it’s too late.”
Michelle found out she was infected after her infant son tested HIV positive. She lived with her secret for a year and continued to have unprotected sex with her husband. It wasn’t until the authorities threatened to tell her husband about her condition that she was forced to tell him she was sick.
“Michael”
“I wasn’t like a surprise, because it could happen to anyone, and if you been around, even more. And she been around with more than one different relationship, so when she tell me there’s a possibility, it could have happened, I don’t really find it difficult, because to me I see it as part of the world rotation.”
“Actually, to show her that I didn’t mad with her, I went and had sex with her, just to let her feel like… because that is one of the things, because if I goh awn bad with her she’ll feel like maybe this will stop and then we start to have other things. Once sexual activity is not there, we will have other problems.”
But unlike Michelle, many infected persons never tell their spouses about their status, even when symptoms start showing up. Some of those symptoms are already visible in Michael and Michelle’s ten-year-old daughter. They have decided not to tell the little girl that she is HIV positive.
“Michelle”
“Right now she’s already having like full blown, all her lymph nodes are swollen, her body is already taking water, she wakes up in the morning, her body is swollen, as the day go by it goes down, her body is taking water. We are looking forward that we might lose her in a very short time. But it’s all part of life and we just can’t say when. Whatever happens, we got to deal with it, life doesn’t stop there.”
Dealing with their new life has not been easy, but the counselling sessions they’ve been attending at the Alliance Against AIDS have helped. Director, Rodel Beltran Perera, says he wishes more victims would get help before it’s too late.
Rodel Beltran Perera, Director, Alliance Against AIDS
“Even at the infected level it is very difficult to deal with a person that has found out that they are HIV positive. Or are now, because we are seeing it in Belize, that the infected person doesn’t seek medical attention until they start getting ill, until the syndrome starts showing up.”
“They do not have the information or have not sought out the information, they continue having unprotected sex. Not only unprotected sex with their out of marriage partners, but within. They return home to have unprotected sex with their wives or their husbands, because this is happening. It is not only the male infecting the female, but also the female infecting the male.”
Part of the national response to HIV/AIDS has been to encourage the use of condoms. But local authorities say certain cultural beliefs and practices have hampered this effort.
Ava Pennill, Director of Human Services
“There’s some belief about the use of condoms and the use of condom is not popular. It needs to be made popular. They see the use of condoms as unnatural, because in their terms, it’s not skin on skin. So there’s some unnatural or some plastic, artificial-type connotation when you use a condom.”
Rodel Beltran Perera
“In Belize, sex is taboo and if HIV/AIDS comes under that, it is even more difficult. Difficult for a woman to tell the male partner, I need to put a condom on you because I need to protect myself. She is risking herself, she is placing herself at risk of being the recipient of a blue eye or bruises or a beaten body. She is risking herself. We have not been able to talk about it.”
Talking about AIDS will be key element in breaking this fatal cycle and reversing the increasing rates of HIV infections in Belize. But economic factors might actually prevent those in high-risk groups from changing their behaviour.
Ava Pennill
“I think people that are empowered maybe their practices have changed. But people that are on the margin, and those are the people I deal with so I see a bigger picture. People that are on the margin of society, women and children, those people, not that it’s hopeless, but they need to engage in a particular activity in order to live, and by engaging in that activity, they are at risk and they are willing to take that risk.”
Rodel Beltran Perera
“How do we educate them and share with them, that hey, you’re a time bomb and you can’t be spreading this disease out there. The situation in this country is not good, does not look good and will not look good for a number of years, because we cannot put in place put in place the necessary programs as soon as soon as possible.”
“Michelle”
“I scared a lot. The things that worry me the most, I’m like, what if all of us drop sick the same time? Who’s going to take care of the kids, who is going to take care of us? The questions are there everyday and you know, at counselling, they say you deal with it one day at a time, when you reach that bridge you cross it, that’s how we deal with it.”
“I look at myself and I’m like, how long do I have left? And everyday I look up, I thank the Lord for sparing my life with health and strength for one more day and you live it as the day goes by. You don’t plan for tomorrow, you don’t. You just live today and say IF tomorrow comes.”
Tomorrow ten thousand more people will be infected worldwide with HIV. There’s a good chance there will be at least one Belizean in that number. Authorities here say there will have to be even more deaths before Belizeans start changing the way they live.
The family featured in this story are still living together. The mother is in and out of the hospital, and so is the little girl, but they are still alive.
