 30/11/05 |
 Tackling
the impact of AIDS
On the eve of World AIDS Day (December 1),Online Catholics'
Chris McGillion reports on an initiative by one (Catholic) Australian
AIDS organization to ease the plight of some of the 14 million
children made orphaned by the disease, most of them struggling
for life in southern Africa, and desperate to find a place called
home.
Around 25 million men, women and children have died from AIDS
around the world. Another 40 million are calculated to be presently
infected and three million will die of the disease in the next
twelve months. Apart from the obvious scandal of those figures,
a further 14 million children have been orphaned by the disease.
A Melbourne AIDS charity, the Australian AIDS Fund Incorporated,
has been involved in AIDS-care work for some 20 years. Now it
has now taken some of those orphans under its wing.
“On the eve of World AIDS Day, it seemed the best time to
make the point that homelessness and AIDS travel hand in hand,
that to open your mouth and admit your infection is to get yourself
discarded by society” says Brian Haill, the founder/president
of The Australian AIDS Fund (www.aids.net.au)
“In March this year we received the most piteous SOS from
a remote village in Malawi, one of the ten poorest nations in
the world, which bills itself as ‘The warm heart of Africa’
A country of 11 million souls of whom some five million are facing
starvation, one in 14 has HIV.
“The villagers who’d banded together to care for some
40 orphans, had used an internet café in the commercial
capital, Blantyre, to appeal for international assistance. They
asked if we’d build them an orphanage to house and care for
100 children. Given that we’re probably the smallest AIDS
agency in Australia, with no church [the Australian AIDS Fund
incorporated advocates the use of condoms to prevent the spread
of AIDS] or government income and no paid employees, they might
just as well have asked for three jumbo jets.”
Haill says the fund responded by buying a small house which soon
became home to 32 orphans; 17 boys and 15 girls, aged between
eight and fifteen. The make-shift orphanage was named San Michel
after the home for men with HIV/AIDS that the fund had run in
Melbourne for many years.
“Fretting over the thought of them living together like
sardines, with the one toilet and the one bathing room between
them and the long everyday queues to use the facilities, we begged
for help and now the girls have a house of their own on the same
half acre and their own toilet and bathroom. A third toilet was
added last month along with a stand-alone brick kitchen, equipped
with two gas stoves and some stainless steel pots.”
When the village’s two water bores finally failed, the fund
was eventually able to find enough money to sink a new bore which
will meet the needs of the area’s 5,000 people for several
years. The benefactor was an elderly widow.
“The story of Jesus with the woman at the well has always
been one of my favourite bible stories,” Haill told Online
Catholics. “So, to mark the generosity of the woman who paid
for the work, we had the new bore named ‘Elsie’s Well’
and had some brick seating installed around it and, soon, some
fruit trees will be planted for shade.
A five room primary school has also been built on the site and
been named “The Australian School – Orphans’ Learning
Centre”. It will cater for 300 children when it opens next
January.
Until recently, the children had to rely on discarded coke bottle
tops for toys; now they have some footballs, cricket bats and
hoops. A radio cassette player provides music in San Michel and
a wide-eyed audience of 30 odd children cluster at night around
the colour television set that’s powered by a car battery.
“When we were able to give the youngsters some money to
buy themselves some new clothes, they had a great time. The photo
they sent us looked as if they’d just raided David Jones
at sale time,” says Haill.
“We’ve made sure they’ll have food at Christmas
and for a month or so afterwards while we all hope the rains will
come and bring up the maize seeds in the small agricultural plot
we bought for them.
“Like the children in the village of Msema, we don’t
know when or from where our much needed donations will come from
next.
“But, if you dwell on the picture of 14 million orphans,
you’ll just be crushed and think it’s all just too much.
But small is beautiful, take a handful and just do what you can.
Neither they nor we nor you need to be helpless.”
Anyone wanting to help is invited to send donations to:
The Australian AIDS Fund Incorporated
PO Box 1347, Frankston,
Victoria, 3199.
Brian Haill can be contacted at bhaill@bigpond.net.au
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