FEEDS |

810 Aids orphans in one small village

Number doubles in only 18 months

Nov 30, 2009 10:21 PM | By Simpiwe Piliso

The number of Aids orphans supported in Qunu, home village of former president Nelson Mandela, by a US relief organisation has more than doubled in 18 months.


Current Font Size:
HEALTH BOOST: School pupils tend their vegetable gardens, which help feed the growing number of Aids orphans in Qunu Picture: GARY HORLOR
HEALTH BOOST: School pupils tend their vegetable gardens, which help feed the growing number of Aids orphans in Qunu Picture: GARY HORLOR

Related Multimedia

Related Articles

The Olive Leaf Foundation has registered more than 430 children since June last year. It provides food parcels, school uniforms and school fees, Aids prevention programmes and bereavement counselling for 810 orphans in the village.

The organisation believes there are up to three times that number of orphans in the village and surrounding area because it has not finished an investigation of schools in the district.

On the eve of World Aids Day, villagers spoke of how most of the graves in Qunu, a settlement of people living in round huts in rolling green hills, are of those who died from the virus.

In almost every fenced-in homestead stands one or more tombstones, most bearing the names and ages of people between the ages of 20 and 40.

The pandemic has sown despair and fear among the villagers, locked in desperate lives in ramshackle mud brick homes.

Olive Leaf Foundation's Mthatha manager, Thandie Matikinca, said the organisation also helps about 30 HIV-positive adults in Qunu.

The Sunday Times reported this week that HIV/Aids had gripped Qunu, where seven people die every month.

But health activists and nurses at Qunu Clinic, which was opened by Mandela in 2001, said the figure could treble if families were "honest and disclosed" the cause of death of their members.

Adelaide Madyibi, principal of No Moscow Senior Secondary School, described the pandemic in the village as a "crisis".

She has made pupils wear beaded Aids awareness ribbons at school, introduced compulsory weekly Aids-awareness classes, and instructed children to write poems about the virus, which they recite for classmates.

She has created a vegetable garden that provides meals for the 57 pupils.

All the pupils in the school work in shifts in the garden, twice a week.

Statistics released by the Eastern Cape health department this week showed that 730000 people - about 11% of the province's population - and one in five adults are believed to be HIV-positive.

Nurses at Qunu Clinic, which reports an average of 18 new HIV-positive patients a month, said the number of people on antiretroviral drugs increased from 23 in August to about 30 last month.

They say that increasing numbers of high school pupils visit the clinic daily for Aids tests and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases.

Aids activist Nozuko Mbokodi, 37, who discovered that she was HIV-positive after a life-insurance test, said villagers were frightened of being tested because they feared victimisation and death.

Scores of migrant labourers have returned to the village from the cities severely ill.

"They have come home to die ... it's a devastating situation."

 Loading...

 or  to comment

Comments

Dec 1 2009 04:31:18 AM
grant9
user name
I feel sympathy for rape victims and the orphans. The 20 - 40 year olds who have died should have known better. For the past 25 years it's been drummed into us to use condoms and to (er-hem) stick to one sexual partner.
I see that an aid organization from the despised western world have had to come to the rescue.
Pity our esteemed government ministers have not elected to forgo their new BMW's to help out.
Dec 1 2009 06:59:56 AM
pickedlast
user name
Dec 1 2009 04:31:18 AM
grant9

I have to agree with you fully. People who have AIDS or are affect though no fault of their own like AIDS Orphans need our support 100%. But the people who sleep around, think they are cool or what ever, well I have no pity for them.

The reason why I think S.A. has one of the highest AIDS rates is because of the general population do not understand accountablity. Most of the people don't think their actions will have any negative consequences on their life or the people around them
Dec 1 2009 07:02:38 AM
VinceRSA
user name
The ANC obviously thanks all for their Vote! and will in even greater determination continue this swathe of destruction.
Dec 1 2009 08:14:57 AM
Mzungu
user name
if the Americans give food and other support to that village, the percentage will climb fast to 100%.
Dec 1 2009 08:53:24 AM
siganoga
user name
sigh..!! African success...
Dec 1 2009 09:05:22 AM
Mommacyndi
user name
This is just too frightening for words.
As barbaric and un-constitutional as it sounds, those who are HIV positive should be forced to have birth control. Babies should not have to live with the consequences.
Dec 1 2009 09:30:40 AM
Mzungu
user name
its like young girls getting a baby to secure a grant
Dec 1 2009 09:37:45 AM
trailertrash
user name
The promiscuous mindset of the african males need to change. This idea of its our right to fornicate with anything and anybody needs to change. Most wives are infected by their husbands who feel it is their God given right to sleep around. With a traditional belief that woman are of less value then men this will never change. The sad thing is that these children are the ones who suffer. I say bring in a birth (1 or 2 children to one family) policy as they have in China. This will not only combat overpopulation and create less orphans but will force parents to put more value on the children that they do have. AFrica is a sick and diseased nation. The violent ,sexist primitave mentality has to change. I mean no offence , just stating facts!
Dec 1 2009 09:50:24 AM
trailertrash
user name
My comment applies to a a huge part of the population, there is a minority that really has changed their belief system and mended their ways.
Dec 1 2009 10:15:45 AM
geanann
user name
The rural people are most vulnerable. They just do not believe in modern cures
See
http://letterdash.com/g.annandale/the-problem-with-aids-and-south-africa


Today's Topics