Counsellors give hope to HIV/AIDS patients

On her first day as a counsellor, Tshidi Liphapang, 32, had a long conversation with a woman who did not want to believe that she and her baby were going to die from AIDS.

"Before our counselling session was over, her baby died," she said on Wednesday.

"I was very sorry for her and I kept standing there. I was shivering. I didn't sleep that night."

It was Liphapang's first full day of counselling for this new programme, announced on Wednesday by Cotlands and Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital, in what was perhaps the first counselling service of its kind in the world, said Cotlands director Jackie Schoeman.

The service, sponsored by the Nedcor Foundation, began in April to address the growing need of families who are unable to cope with the social impact of HIV/AIDS.

"It's called counselling, but what we do is offer a whole package," said Busi Nkosi, the home-based-care manager of Cotlands Baby Sanctuary.

The programme is designed to counsel children and caregivers, who are mostly mothers, during clinic visits as well as when the children are need to be treated in hospital.

Families receive follow-up calls and house visits when the child dies, said Nkosi.

"We've got a hospital, a clinic and hospice access to care for the orphans," Nkosi said, but she admitted that more was needed to be done.

A study by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation released on Tuesday showed that only 12 percent of those at risk have access to voluntary HIV/AIDS counselling and testing.

Acknowledging that care and support services for children living with HIV and AIDS were fragmented in South Africa, Schoeman said the programme had been created to add some "informal" stability in caring for children with HIV/AIDS.

"Our plan is to keep this project going as long as it is needed," she said.

Liphapang said the counsellors usually manage to counsel up to four people a day.

"But drugs are needed, which are very expensive, so they can't afford them."

The head of Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital's paediatric HIV outpatient clinic, Dr Tammy Meyers, said people who could afford anti-retroviral treatment were welcome at the clinic.

However, the number of people who could afford anti-retrovirals was a small fraction of the total population living with AIDS, Meyers said.

"The government is not providing anti-retrovirals at the present moment, but we have a service here, if people can afford it, to provide access for treatment."