IRIN PlusNews HIV/AIDS Briefs, 28 August 2001

SOUTH AFRICA: Children speak out about the impact of HIV/AIDS ZIMBABWE: New sex law to curb HIV/AIDS SOUTH AFRICA: Children speak out about the impact of HIV/AIDS Children from across South Africa met in Cape Town last week for the first national conference of children with HIV/AIDS. The children ranged in age from 7 to 18, and discussed the impact of HIV/AIDS on their lives as well as proposals for improving the situation, said a statement received by PlusNews from the child health policy unit of the Red Cross. The children participated in workshops and used art and drama to express the impact of HIV/AIDS. Participants told of having to leave school to care for their infected siblings. Others told of being sexually abused and infected with HIV/AIDS because the perpetrator didn’t want to die alone, the statement said. Rejected by their families, some spoke of having to support themselves by collecting firewood and tending cattle. “It’s like I am a slave,” one of the children wrote in a testimonial. Sonja Giese, HIV/AIDS Coordinator for the Children’s Institute, told IRIN that most of the children had received negative treatment from teachers, nurses and churches. She said that the children had been discriminated against and had received little support from their communities. The children called for basic services such as food and shelter and asked for support for their caregivers, in most cases, their grandparents. On Friday, they met with decision makers from government departments and national parliamentary committees to draft proposals to address problem areas. Giese said that the organisers were disappointed by the poor turn out of politicians at the conference. Dr Nono Simelela, head of the health department’s AIDS program, told the children the government was doing the best it could, but the processes were slow. ZIMBABWE: New sex law to curb HIV/AIDS Zimbabwe has passed a new law that criminalises the deliberate transmission of HIV/AIDS, recognises rape in marriages, and imposes heavy penalties for other sexual offenses, AFP reported on Monday. The Sexual Offenses Act, which also seeks to protect youths and mentally handicapped persons from sexual predators, was recently signed into law by President Robert Mugabe. The new law makes it an offense to willfully infect others with the virus. A person convicted of deliberately transmitting HIV/AIDS can receive a prison sentence of up to 20 years. “Any person who, having actual knowledge that he is infected with HIV, intentionally does anything or permits the doing of anything which he knows ... will infect another person with HIV, shall be guilty of an offense,” reads part of the act. Although there are fears that the new law may put people off getting tested for HIV/AIDS, Sunanda Ray, director of the Southern African AIDS Dissemination Information Services was quoted as saying that “most people get tested to protect themselves, not others.” A lawyer for the Gays and Lesbians Association of Zimbabwe, Derek Matyseck, said the 20-year sentence for willful transmission of HIV was “only symbolic,” given that most people die within a few years of becoming infected.