Nine years living with HIV

If you have ever thought being contacting HIV, the virus that start Aids is the end of the road, you better think again. Henry Mahwayo would change your fears into hope. Geoffrey Kapusa chats with the 29 year old man, who is still single but has hopes of getting married and have children one day.

I have met Henry several times and the transformation was so vivid the last times I met him. Dressed in a dark brown jacket and a nice pair of black trousers, Henry usually likes to finish off his outfit with a pair of sandals. But the day he showed up for this interview, Henry was wearing black shoes.

In 1999 Henry Mahwayo voluntary tested for HIV/Aids and was found positive. Several factors attributes to his status, but as he narrates his story, unprotected sex--fashionable in the early 90’s-- was the major cause of his lifetime ordeal.

“Happiness, those days, meant drinking beer and sleeping with women without condoms. When you talked of condoms you were deemed uncivilized,” he said looking straight into my eyes.

However, Henry developed a health situation and coupled with a series of deaths in his family, included his mother, brothers and sisters, and a blood donation exercise in at Kamba in Blantyre forced him to know his blood status.

“I don’t have any brother or sister. I had four sisters and three brothers who have all died of the HIV/Aids. My brothers and sisters died in 1996, 1999 and in 2004. My mother died in 2006. Apparently my mother separated from my father in 1981.” Henry narrates his story.

But then, a ray of hope never left Henry, the only surviving member of the family. In 2002 he learnt that government was now giving out free Anti Retroviral drugs (ARVs) to only those who were ‘very sick’.

Henry’s condition by then was not ‘serious’ despite being HIV positive.

Three years later, Henry’s legs started swelling due to what he thought was malnutrition and lack of blood. In medical terms he had developed cancer of the legs.

Two years later Henry’s condition worsened, prompting him to seek medical attention at the Lighthouse at Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe.

“I went for another HIV test at the Lighthouse and was told to go there a week later to get the results, which came out positive.”

By June 21 st 2007, Henry was put on an ARV treatment after receiving canceling. However, the pain on his swelling legs continued. Two months later doctors changed his dosage.

Four months down the line, Henry visited the Tiyanjane Clinic at Queen Elizabeth where a new drug Vincristine administered however nothing changed. He then started experienced a continued numbness on his swolen legs and was then advised to stop taking Vincristine.

Today Henry is back on ARV and is now able to put on shoes because of the improvements made on his swelling legs. He also takes other supplements like Antilip Tea and Chitosan Capsules which he also uses to boost his immunity.

Henry also takes Sibusiso, a ready food supplement which he got following the advice he got from the Secretary for Nutrition, HIV/Aids Dr Mary Shawa.

“I have the Sibusiso Ready Food Supplement Voucher from the Department of Nutrition, HIV/Aids in collaboration with Gift of Givers Foundation.”

Government of Malawi through the Office of President and Cabinet put in place the initiative to assist people living with HIV/Aids to live positive and have their diet complete by among other things, giving them a tin of milk, 2 vouchers of Sibusisio at K400 each, thus subsidizing the cost of K1,300.00 to just K900.00.

On the role of the media, Henry says it is doing enough though he thinks the target group, meaning those with HIV positive must receive a special attention as the perception to the HIV/Aids messages differs from those positive and those negative.

“All you need is talking to people with the problem. An HIV Positive person can better advise those who are positive better than those who are negative.”

Responding to the need for positive writing on HIV/Aids stories that usually suffers stigma in coverage by most media houses, an Association for Journalists Against Aids has since been formed following a workshop conducted by Media Desk of Zimbabwe, an arm of South Africa Against Aids (Safaids) initiative.

On a very positive side of the story, Henry hopes to get married to his HIV negative girlfriend.

“I told her am HIV positive and she thought I was joking. We went to QECH in January 2008 for testing. By then we had not yet started sleeping together. Since then we use condoms all the time and I enjoy sex without feeling like losing something.”

And who said HIV Positive people will never be fathers and or mothers? Henry smiles and through his eyes I could see hope and faith in his future life.

“I would like to have kids at one time. It is possible to have a wife and kids. The doctors tell me that it is possible to have kids who can be negative and my girlfriend is aware of the information available about people living with HIV/Aids.”

With his Junior Certificate of Education, Henry can hardly get employed and is staying in a house without water and electricity and hardly pay for his K1, 500.00 house rent.

Hope is the last thing Henry will make sure to lose in his precious life.

The Author, Geoffrey Kapusa is a TVMalawi Producer and Presenter and also a committee member of the Association Journalists Against Aids, formed following a two day workshop with SafAids recently in Blantyre, Malawi.