Matigara, Jan. 5: Twenty one HIV positive patients have found shelter and care at Jesu Ashram, a missionary home for the destitute, in the last nine months.
“Our worst fears are confirmed. The number of HIV cases has been steadily rising over the last few years,” said Father Julius, who is in-charge of Jesu Ashram.
Six people who tested HIV positive had come to the ashram seeking shelter and help in 2001. The number rose to 10 last year. In the last nine months, the number has more than doubled last year’s count.
Rupa was the 21st HIV positive patient to have come to the ashram. Her eyes fixed in a vacant gaze, her only support, a stick, lying next to her, the 18-year-old girl silently awaits her final destiny.
Rupa’s health has steadily deteriorated over the last few months, symptoms she has learnt to recognise after 15 of her friends passed away after showing similar signs.
“There is no escape. Only death will end the agony this disease has brought,” she says between short gasps of breath.
The fear expressed by experts about AIDS assuming alarming proportions in the subdivision seems well-founded.
This, however, is just the tip of the iceberg, with many cases going unreported due to lack of awareness and fear of social ostracism. Rupa’s only companions are three fellow sufferers who are kept in isolation in a separate building.
“Initially we kept them in the tuberculosis ward since all of them, with the exception of one, were suffering from tuberculosis. In fact, they initially came to the ashram complaining of tuberculosis. It was during the course of treatment that we discovered that they were suffering from AIDS. They all came here in the last stages of the disease and are not responding to medication,” Father Julius said.
Though the ashram is not geared to treat AIDS patients, it keeps doors open to sufferers.
“We can only provide symptomatic treatment and give them love, which they are denied outside,” Father Julius said.
The ashram is now planning to develop infrastructure to cater to the needs of HIV patients.
“We are not equipped to treat HIV patients. Very soon we will have adequate infrastructure to do so. Now we can only offer them shelter in their last days and ensure that they get attention and care. Often, the patients have no relatives and friends. When they die we arrange for the last rites as well,” said Father Julius.
