It Is Not a Death Sentence

Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Rwanda Supports Local Groups to Fight AIDS Stigma

"I am sorry I infected you and did not tell you," Innocent Niwsi murmured as he lay dying on his bed. He had summoned the courage to admit to Beatrice, his young, second wife that he was HIV positive and dying. His first wife had also died from an AIDS-related illness.

That was in 2000, when the stigma associated with HIV and AIDS was very high. Niwsi was being treated by a traditional medicine man, which may have accelerated his demise. When Beatrice was finally able to convince her husband to come back home and get proper treatment, provided free at hospitals and health centers across Rwanda, he was already paralyzed, and he passed away shortly afterwards.

Today, 35-year-old Beatrice is a person living with HIV. She married Niwsi when she was just 22 and they had two children, Nadine and Yves. When she was expecting her second child, she started having severe abdominal pains and went to a family planning clinic in the capital, Kigali for a check-up.

While there, the doctors encouraged her to go for counseling and further testing. She was diagnosed as HIV positive, news that hit her so hard that she at first contemplated suicide. But the thought of the impact this would have on her family made her change her mind.

Income Generation

After her husband’s death, the mother of two decided to move to Nyamata in Bugesera district, just half an hour’s drive from Kigali, where she settled in with her mother. Thinking that death was imminent, she preferred to be buried close to her.

Beatrice recalls her first few years in Nyamata, saying she felt like she was "wearing a scarlet letter 'I' for 'infected,’'" as everyone knew her status and avoided her. She was unemployed and living off her mother's small plot that they cultivated together to feed the family.

In 2007 she heard of a local association called Kotwibu, which helps people living with HIV access treatment and other forms of assistance. Upon becoming a member, she received a goat to help her earn some income. The goat was a welcomed gift and it soon reproduced. The sale of the baby goat generated a small income that Beatrice stretched to make ends meet for a while.

Rwanda has an HIV prevalence rate of an estimated three percent in a population of around 9 million people. Kotwibu, remarks Beatrice, is a sign that the AIDS stigma is decreasing in the country, and that there is hope. As an association member, she benefits from resources and benefits such as training programs on HIV prevention, trauma counseling and savings and credit operations, supported by the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Department for World Service (DWS) country program in Rwanda.

She also benefits from medical insurance coverage, learns how to weave baskets, manage a small business, and is encouraged to revitalize her livelihood by selling artifacts produced by the association. She has managed to save some money and plans to increase her savings in order to access credit. In the meantime, she has found a job as a cleaning lady.

Hope

Nine years after diagnosis and despite the difficult and painful experiences, Beatrice is a living testimony that being HIV positive is not a death sentence, and that one can receive treatment and lead a healthy and productive life. She socializes with friends and relatives without feeling like an outcast, and is ready to build a future for herself and her family.

Her children have tested negative for HIV. Beatrice never breastfed her second child on doctors' orders so as to avoid mother-to-child-transmission. But she has no rational explanation as to why her 13-year-old firstborn, Nadine, is HIV negative and simply says: "It is a miracle."

Beatrice actively participates in local and national sensitization campaigns on HIV and AIDS, teaching people how to live with the disease and how to avoid infection in the first place. She is grateful to DWS Rwanda for the training and awareness raising, all of which have enabled her to renew her life and given her hope.