Duration:5 min 32 sec
Transcript:

KHOPOTSO: It was an occassion deserving of the national anthem. For the first time since Lesotho faced its first case of AIDS in 1986, an opportunity to make antiretroviral therapy available to people who need it in the public health sector was being welcomed.

Over the years statistics from reported incidences indicate that over 15 000 Basotho have died as a result of AIDS and that more than 300 000 are infected. And there couldn’€™t have been a better place to launch the programme than at the Senkatana Centre of Excellence in Botshabelo, a 20-minutes drive from the capital, Maseru. As Mmaditeboho Kolobe, a counsellor at the Centre of Excellence explains, this is a place where history meets the present.

MMADITEBOHO KOLOBE: This place in itself used to be a leper settlement. It’€™s surprising (now) that it is going to be an HIV/AIDS settlement. Those two things coming together like that remove a lot of stigma. People coming here this time will have no fear of being stigmatised.

KHOPOTSO: As Sesotho folklore would have it the Centre itself has been named after a warrior boy, Moshanyana Senkatana, who saved his villagers from the belly of a huge monster named Khodumodumo.

MMADITEBOHO KOLOBE: There was a big animal that ate all the people and everybody was in there. And nobody was ready to see how to secure those people in there, eaten by this big animal. And there was a young Mosotho boy who said I’€™m going to kill this animal and help those people out. So, he took one of the simplest things to do and hit the animal. So, we are naming this Centre after that incident of saving people. We are hoping that this Centre will save a lot people from this big epidemic. Once that boy stabbed the animal everybody came out safe.                      

KHOPOTSO: Dr Hind Sati is one of two doctors working at the clinic.

DR HIND SATI: Our project is for three years and we are planning to see and help 1 200 patients by the end of the three years’€¦ But, hopefully we are going to get some assistance from the government, so we’€™ll have more drugs so we can see more patients.  

KHOPOTSO: The project has been set up with a grant of M26 million (the equivalent of R26 million) from pharmaceutical firm Bristol-Myers-Squibb as part of its ‘€œSecure the Future’€ programme in five southern African nations, including South Africa. A major concern is what happens in three years after the sponsorship expires? Dr Pearl Ntshekge is Project Director of the Senkatana Centre and HIV/AIDS Services in Lesotho.

DR PEARL NTSHEKGE: The health of a nation is a responsibility of government. And that responsibility is continuous and permanent. With or without HIV/AIDS we have a responsibility to continue to maintain the health of our people. So, there’€™ll be ways in between the phasing out of the three years’€¦ to see that government takes on a greater responsibility each year and we look also at our partners – international and local’€¦ to ensure that the project is sustained beyond three years.    

KHOPOTSO: Dr Motloheloa Phooko is Lesotho’€™s Health Minister.

DR PHOOKO: There is total political commitment to issues around HIV and AIDS. In all the political meetings and rallies that we hold one cannot finish addressing the public without referring to HIV and AIDS issues. That is standard. And that is determined from the top with the Prime Minister himself who dictates that every politician must talk about HIV and AIDS issues.    

KHOPOTSO: Lesotho might have in abundance what its neighbour, South Africa, has lacked in the last decade ‘€“ the political commitment to fight the scourge of AIDS. Yet, its well-intentioned politics on HIV and AIDS are not accompanied by the equally important financial commitment. Instead, the Kingdom relies on donor funds for its AIDS treatment programme. Two more sites are in the pipeline in the districts of Leribe and Mohaleshoek, north and south of the capital, thanks to a $32 million allocation from the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. These sites will lessen the pressure on the Senkatana Centre in Maseru and also on the neighbouring newly established sites of the Free State, across the border in South Africa, where it is feared that Basotho might move to for access to treatment. Under the WHO’€™s sponsored plan to make treatment available to three million people in poor nations by next year, Lesotho is expected to have put 28 000 people on antiretrovirals. That target might have to be revised, though. Another shortfall is that the current and imminent sites do not make provision for the treatment of children. However, the ball has started rolling and it cannot afford to stop now.        

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