The Amangwe Village Project: an oasis for AIDS patients

A lack of funding for local municipalities to take up the fight against the HIV/AIDS epidemic is one of a number of obstacles to combating a disease that could have dire consequences for South Africa: a predicted 1 850 000 orphans of AIDS in 12 years' time.

Bhekisisa Mthethwa, Mayor of the uThungulu District, northern KwaZulu-Natal, one of the regions worst affected by HIV/AIDS, said other "key gaps" identified by delegates at a recent stakeholders' workshop included a lack of involvement on the part of traditional leaders and healers. Home-based care programmes are not co-ordinated or standardised, and there is a lack of openness and early disclosure, (which prevents timely support and treatment of sufferers), as well as poor access to government services.

Mthethwa said his municipality, which incorporates five local councils, was developing a strategic plan to combat HIV/AIDS, which was not just a medical problem but also had social and economic consequences.

He said there would be a focus on community-based initiatives that offered care and support to patients as well as treatment and awareness and prevention measures, right down to individual households. The District Council aims to set up an HIV/AIDS Desk at the municipality to drive its strategic plan and co-ordinate its involvement in fighting the disease. uThungulu had applied for "significant" funding from the United Nations for this purpose.

Methethwa this week presented a cheque of R35 000 to the Amangwe Village Project in KwaMbonambi to help fund the training of community healthcare co-ordinators, who will take HIV/AIDS awareness and education to surrounding rural communities. He said the Village would become "an oasis of hope" for thousands of HIV/AIDS sufferers and their families. He said it bore testimony to the commitment of all its stakeholders in the District to tackle the disease with courage and conviction.

His Council was proud to be associated with the Amangwe Project and its many partners. Not only it the first of its kind in South Africa, but also "a leading light globally in the fight against HIV/AIDS". Mondi Kraft had donated the 10-hectare former timber-workers' village to the Zululand Chamber of Business Foundation, for conversion into a care centre for HIV/AIDS infected and affected children and adults.

The Centre will be opened officially on World AIDS Day, 1 December 2003, and aims to become "the flagship resource centre for HIV/AIDS intervention in Zululand". An expansion of the successful Ethembeni Care Centre - a Foundation-associated project supported by leading industries in Richards Bay - the Village will provide a temporary place of safety for orphans and cluster fostering, with a specialised paediatric ward, and is being upgraded from an 18-bed to a 45-bed facility.