By Raju Joseph | Project Leader
Giving Hope….
There are quite a number persons living with HIV in the working villages of SPPD. And the suffering of the children of the parents living with HIV is extremely miserable. Hence, taking their pathetic plight in to account SPPD has involved in the intervention of providing nutritional food supplements and other activities to towards the healthy survival and development of the children living with HIV here in the villages. This program could be carried out with the noble support of the Give India.
The nutritional kit comprised of the following items of lentils, pulses and other vitamin rich items.
The distribution of this nutritional supplement kit goes a long way in helping the children living with HIV here to cope up with the demands of the ART therapy that the persons living with HIV have to undergo for their very survival. Nutritional food is very much necessary to maintain a good immunity levels and thus their CD4 count in balance. This apart, at the time of their receiving the nutritional kit, the children and their parents received counseling on various aspects about maintaining their health in fighting the condition caused by the HIV infection.
Surya
Surya (name changed) is 13 years old and is living with HIV as he got infected from the dreaded disorder from his mother. His mother had passed years ago and his elder sister also had died when she was four years old due to HIV infection that she contracted from her mother.
Surya’s father had abandoned the family when he was hardly two years old and he has been living in the care of his maternal grandfather. His grandfather is partially disabled with a limping leg has been taking care of Surya with the small income he makes. Though his grandson carries the social stigma of being HIV positive and his own partial disability he has been trying his best to take care of Rajendran.
Surya’s grandmother is sickly and cannot contribute to the family’s expense. With the corona pandemic further damaging the livelihood, his grandfather has been struggling hard. With Surya being under ART (Antiretroviral Therapy), his health has been deteriorating with weight loss and decrease in CD count due to malnutrition during these times. CD count is a vital health parameter to be maintained for persons living with HIV.
Under these circumstances, the groceries kit given by Give India has proved to be a panacea for the entire family especially for the health of Rajendran. His grandfather while thanking the sponsors of Give India and SPPD says the variety of dry food items of the kit and the substantial quantity has enabled him to bolster the health of Surya.
Tamilarasan
Tamilarasan (name changed) and his three children two daughters and a son live in the village of Trichirapalli district. All the four of in the family have been living with HIV. Tamilarasan’s wife had died out of AIDS more than a decade ago.
Since then, Tamilarasan has been taking care of the children who all have been under ART therapy, despite his own weak health condition caused by the HIV infection. Now though his two daughters have grown up and trying to earn their own livelihood by taking up work as tailoring assistants the Covid pandemic situation has left them in dire straits as such jobs have become scarce. Tamilarasan’s son the youngest in the family is undergoing ITI (vocational skill course).
All the four in the family have to mandatorily undergo the ART medicine for survival and this in turn requires good nutritional supplements. And during the pre-corona times though minimal, the contributions from the two daughters was helping them to meet this need to a great extent. But with that income having been greatly reduced the family was finding it extremely difficult.
In such a situation according to Tamilarasan the groceries kit they have received from Give India will go a long way in helping all the four members to keep their immunity and to increase the CD count of all of them.
He further says this groceries kit comprising of rice, wheat, lentils, oil and other rations would help to meet the nutritional needs of the family for a period of at least two months till the girls start again to earn. All of them express their gratitude to all in the Give India and SPPD for this great help in these struggling times.
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