Trinidad and Tobago: We Cannot be Alienated!

Excerpt from a presentation by a member of Community Action Resource, to the CRN+ Capacity Building Workshop, St. Ann’s, Trinidad, 20-21 October 2000.

Can you imagine what would happen if we were told: "ALL YOU PEOPLE MUST BE ALIENATED FROM SOCIETY! HERE IS AN ISLAND; YOU HAVE TO GO THERE"

Would we simply pack our things, say goodbye to those who would simply listen to us, and be on our way? Or would we take a STAND - UNITED - and say, "we must not and cannot be alienated!"

As people living with HIV/AIDS, we are faced with the daily struggles of alienation - from family, friends, society, health care workers, employers, insurance companies - all of whom disregard us and treat us with scorn. Oh yes, and the governments who totally ignore us.

Here in the Caribbean, we are constantly bombarded by complaints about our health care system and its workers. It seems that as soon as the letters HIV/AIDS are mentioned, a light flashes in the minds of health care workers: ALERT! ALERT! Treat this person with the 4Ds - disdain, discourtesy, disrespect and distrust.

Recently, I went to the hospital to visit a girl. "How are you doing?" I asked with a smile.

"The doctors and nurses said that I am going to die, so I want to die quick," she said. She died a week later. Who knows what would have happened if they had said, "Girl, you could live." Imagine what she would have said to herself.

We need health care workers who are sensitive to our issues and are able to get up to date information on treatment, both physical and psychosocial, so as to be able to monitor our health in a dignified manner.

To depend on government for handouts is not what we want to do. We want to be able to work and provide for our families. We don’t want to be a burden to society. All we want is for government to provide us with medication and proper health care.

Once we are physically capable, we would like to enjoy some form of economic independence. We want our employers to know that we can do our jobs without posing any risk to others. We do not have to disclose our status to our employers but when they find out and fire us from our jobs, we are forced to depend on the same society that chastised us in the first place.

In some instances, we have been refused access to housing, employment and insurance because of our HIV status. Support groups provide us with a safe environment in which to discuss whom, when and how to disclose our status. People living with HIV/AIDS must, as a group, educate, inform and empower each other to cope with the daily running of our lives.

Community Action Resource is a voluntary, non-profit AIDS service organisation, which was formed to address some of the needs of persons living with HIV/AIDS in Trinidad and Tobago.