What is the relationship betwen AIDS and poverty?
It is a double edged-blade. Because of poverty you are pushed into vulnerable situations including selling sex, but also, and this is the other blade, when you are poor and you are infected with HIV and progressed into AIDS, it will push you more to poverty because you need to buy expensive medicine to prolong your life and pay laboratory services to monitor your HIV status. All the theses call for huge amount of money. Plus of course, when one is already on the terminal stage, he or she can’t work anymore. And somebody in the family might also stop working to provide the day-to-day care and support. What is your plans for the next 5 years for fighting AIDS in Nepal? Well, we hope the target set by Nepal towards universal access to prevention, treatment, care and support could be achieved- that is what we are all working for. This will be midway in achieving MDG 6 target 7 for Nepal. We must understand that AIDS is a preventable disease. Unlike in the past, now it could be treated. Alt
