Care and Support 50 HIV+ Orphan Children in India

The support group meeting for adolescents living with HIV is organised every first saturday at Government Hospital. The center not only caters to young people from the district but serves as a point of care for adoelscents from the neighbouring districts. Understanding the need for adolescent focussed intervention Buds of Christ with the support from the ART center has been organising support groups to help young people live healthy and productive lives.

It has been a greater challenge to bring the adolescents together, as the ART center was seen only as a center to access medicines. The young people had no opportunity to interact with each other and the stigma of HIV and restrictions of the care takers(mostly grand-parents) had not allowed them to talk about it. With the support group being initiated, the young people have started showing active involvement through the participatory exercises. This month the exercise was on boosting their self esteem. In the pre-assessment it was noted that most of them had a low self image about themselves, due to side effects of ARV and low immunity status. But through the exercise, the positive qualities of each one was shared by the peers and was reinstated with the thought that each one is unique and have special qualities.

"I have always felt I was short and weak and unworthy, but here when the friends in the group appreciated me, I felt very good" - expressed an adolescent boy

Following this, the young people were taken through an exercise of setting personal goals in health and education and how as a support group they can support one another through a team building game, making the paper tower. The four points that was reinforced for the participants were planning, sharing their plan and finding support from one another, implementing and evaluating .This helped the participants to set their health goals and education goals.

Recent case study

Ms. Anita (name changed),17 years old, was born living with HIV, Her parents died when she was very young and has been cares by her grandmother. She came to know about her HIV status only when she was in her 11th standard i.e.16 years old. Though she has been on medication earlier, her grand-mother could not express the health status nor the medication properly and that has caused resistance. Now she is on second line medication. She is attending the meeting for the last two month and have found inspiration from the peer leader, Shalini from Buds of Christ who supports in the monthly support group meeting.