Duration 5min 22sec

Transcript

SUE VALENTINE: The offices of Medecins Sans Frontiers and the Treatment Action Campaign are on the top floor of a two-storey building surrounded by shops and street vendors in the heart of town square Site B, Khayelitsha. The security gate at the office doorway squeaks incessantly with the steady traffic of staff and visitors, some of whom have agreed to talk about how their lives have changed through being part of an organisation that offers advice, support and hope.

NONCEDO BULANA: I’€™m Noncedo Bulana I stay at Site C, I’€™m old but I can’€™t tell how old I am, but I’€™m a mother of four boys, the first one is 16, the other one is 14, 10 and 8. When I got sick an other brother of mine who’€™s HIV+ said I must go and test, and I said ‘€œNo, I can’€™t be HIV positive, I don’€™t have many boyfriends, I’€™ve got only one’€. But then I become sick in September in 2001 and I collapsed on a bed and my children moved up and down calling the neighbours to take me to hospital. In hospital they didn’€™t ask me ‘€œdo you like to be tested or not?’€, they just took out the blood. The results when they come out they told my mother, ‘€œyour child has got HIV, TB, pneumonia and meningitis’€. I noticed my mother she had that shock of HIV thing. Then my mother asked the doctor, ‘€œhow are we going to cure the HIV?’€. The doctor said, ‘€œoh, there’€™s no cure’€. And it was just like that.  

SV: Noncedo was lucky. She was able to get onto the antiretroviral treatment programme provided by Medecins sans Frontieres. That was a year and seven months ago.

NONCEDO BULANA: I feel so proudly, I am living this second life now, this second life to me is a lucky one. Previously I was just living. Now I’€™m so conscious, when I wake up I must do the correct things, I must advise people about the life, they must play the sex carefully, because me I was so careless I ended up having this HIV thing. So, that’€™s why I say it was my second life opportunity, because I nearly died.

THOBANE NCAPAI: I’€™m Thobane Ncapai I stay at Site C in 918 B. I came from Transkei but I came here in Cape Town in 1998 in January.

SV: What made you come to Cape Town?

THOBANE NCAPAI: On the 19th of January 1997 I was diagnosed HIV positive. At the end of the year, 1997, I decided to come hereto cape Town, because I was having a lot of problems, so my friends decided to take me to Cape Town. I came here early in 1998 and I was admitted in Conradie Hospital and Groote Schuur hospital in and out in the hospital.

SV: After six months in hospital, Thabane was discharged. He then spent nine months on TB treatment in Khayelitsha where he came into contact with Medecins Sans Frontieres. At that time MSF was able only to treat opportunistic infections, however this changed the following year when they introduced the first antiretroviral treatment programme in a public sector setting.

NCAPAI: In the next year, 2001, I was one of those people who were selected to take the antiretrovirals from MSF. Why I was taking those antiretrovirals was because I was having that dihorrea again, losing weight, vomitting, and I was weighing 21kg. Before taking the antiretrovirals, my Doctor take the blood for CD4 count and viral load.   My CD4 count was 178 and my viral load was 240 000 which means it was very bad. So, he gave me a consent form to read it, there is a consent form with 15 pages, I tried to read that consent form for about   two weeks. After that I bring it back and I told my doctor that I decided to take antiretrovirals because I saw that I’€™m going to die.

SV: Thobane has been on treatment now for two years and six months. He has had no side effects and no resistance to the combination of drugs on which he started out. His viral load is undetectable and his CD4 cell count is above 600. Vital to his health, he says, is the support of friends, family and fellow TAC members.

NCAPAI: After two years I’€™ve got the support at Treatment Action Campaign because all the time they gave us some workshops about opportunistic infections, about HIV and AIDS about how to use these antiretrovirals. It’€™s important to get support like that. Because if you have made a mistake you know that this is wrong. There are support groups at the clinics where all the people who are HIV positive attend and discuss their problems. So when we meet together and discuss our problems you see that, my problem is not bigger than that one. If there was no MSF and Treatment Action Campaign, I wouldn’€™t be here just now, maybe I would be passed away years ago. So MSF and TAC they bring my life back.

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