AIDS:RAISING_AWARENESS

One fine evening, I was dining in a restaurant with my parents, which was very close to the beach. To enjoy the pleasant beach weather, I stepped out of the restaurant and sat on a lawn which was attached to the restaurant. Suddenly I heard a sound of group of people who were shouting “Finding the cure starts with hope”. When I went close to the rally to read the banners they were carrying, I found that, on the occasion of World AIDS Day, one of the reputed educational institutes of the city had organized a rally to spread awareness about AIDS.

This made me recall one of the bitter experiences of my life. When I was 19 years old, I suffered from severe chicken-pox. To get it cured, my father took me to one of the famous multispecialty hospitals in the city. I was waiting for my turn when I suddenly saw a young man who was praying to God sitting in his chair waiting for his turn. He was almost crying. A nurse came out of the doctor’s chamber and called Mr.Ajay, which was actually the young man’s name. He stood up from his chair and made a quick walk to the doctor’s chamber. Just after a span of five minutes, the doctor came out of his chamber and threw the file full of prescriptions and reports out. The doctor was shouting at the top of his voice saying “Get out of this hospital, this hospital is not meant for people like you and never show your dirty face again”. The doctor’s voice made me so scared that I made my father move out from the hospital. In the parking lot we saw that the young man Ajay was sitting in a corner and crying. My father made an attempt to ask Ajay the reason for which he was asked to move out of hospital. Ajay replied that he was HIV AIDS positive and the doctors refused to treat him with no reason. He also said that he was being treated the same way in other hospitals too and due to unhealthy environment in the Government hospital he did not make an attempt to go there. My father and me were so sorry for him and dropped him at his house. His parents were eagerly waiting for him since a long time near the gates of his house.

 After four days, when my father was taking me to the hospital for check up, we were passing by Ajay’s house. We saw a huge crowd at the gate of his house, we went into the house and saw Ajay’s dead body lying on the staircase. We asked people there about the incident; they said that Ajay had been in a very depressed state since the past two days and that day early morning he was shouting and running all over his house and suddenly slipped off from the staircase and lost his life. As Ajay was HIV positive, no one tried to touch his dead body which was really ridiculous. His parents were weeping but there was no one to comfort them, neither relatives nor friends.

This incident clearly tells us about the lack of awareness on AIDS but here it simply puts me in a dilemma whether spreading awareness should focus on the doctors or the public?

Since there is no medicine which has been developed so far that can cure these patients, emotional support from the healthcare institutes and from the near and dear ones is the only way to help them lead a dignified life

Ms . SRUTHI YANDRA

MBA First Year