How did the children gain access to antiretroviral drugs?
A lot of it had to do with the first film, Living with Slim: Kids Talk About HIV/AIDS. The minister of health saw it, and he ordered that those kids’ caretakers place them on antiretroviral drugs. But for Juliana, it was too late. That’s because when there’s a low supply of antiretrovirals, only the patients whose CD4 counts are very low qualify to receive them. So in 2004, when the first film was shot, Juliana was on the borderline to qualify for the drugs. By the time the decision was made to give her the drugs, her body couldn’t handle them. She died six months later. The children being older now, what new challenges are they facing? Now that they’re on antiretrovirals, they’re healthy. But they’re not cured. They’re still HIV-positive. The decisions they have to make—and the places it puts them—are different than when they were 10 or 11. As teenagers and young adults, they’re dealing with boyfriends and girlfriends and contemplating marriage and having children. They have to ask th
