PMTC is Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV/AIDS. In Zambia PMTC is available to all expectant mothers that attend Anti-natal Clinics. PMTC if properly adhered to highly reduces the risk of infection from an HIV positive mother to her unborn child and also during child birth. After the child is born, there is also a regime of drugs that are prescribed to the mother and child to prevent infection. PMTC has only became available to expectant mothers in recent years. Some mothers miss the opportunity to prevent infection of their child either because they do not know their status or because they are afraid to be on a PMTC programme even when they know their status. This is very sad because a decision to be part of a PMTC programme can be the greatest gift that a mother can give to her unborn child.
Last week I was extremely touched by a story of a 17 year old Zambian girl living in Mazabuka, a small sugar producing town in the Southern Province. This young girl was born in February 1993. She has 5 elder brothers and sisters and one younger sister. She is a double orphan. Both are parents died in 2003. She is living with her siblings in a house that they bought from their fathers' benefits in a compound known as Nakambala in Mazabuka. Gladys (not real name) found out that she was HIV postive earlier this year after a prolonged illness. She was diagonised with Tuberculosis (TB) in January, 2010 and was put on treatment. However, despite completing the TB treatment her condition did not improve and detriorated further. Medical officials at Mazabuka Hospital therefore advised her to take an HIV test. She was positive. The young girl said that she has accepted her status. She is still being treated for TB and she is not yet on Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) because her CD4 count has not yet being taken. According to Gladys her blood levels are extremely low such that it is had not been possible for medical personnel to get a sample from her frangile body for a CD4 count. Sadly, at the time that I visited Glady at her home she had not been given TB injections for about 3 days due to shortage of TB drugs at Mazabuka Hospital. Gladys's elder sister Anna (not real name) explained that the shortage of TB drugs in Mazabuka's public and private health facilities as well as pharmacies was negatively impacting on the poor health of her sister.
Gladys could not sit for her grade nine final examination due to poor health. She attends school at a community school in Mazabuka where she has been absent for a long time due to her poor health. Gladys does not know how she became infected with HIV. However, her elder sister Anna suspects that Gladys may have acquired the virus from her mother. Gladys' mother become very sick after giving birth to her and Anna suspects that this may have been the time that Gladys contracted the virus. She narrated that Gladys' young sister Mable (not real name) aged 14 years old is also HIV positive and is on ART treatment. I met Mable. She is a shy, fine looking girl.
Gladys' dream is to complete her formal education and to assist her family with financially. For now, this may be a very ambitious dream given her poor health. I hope that relevant authorities will come to the aid of this poor girl and others by stocking all health instutitions with adequate supplies of life saving drugs for TB and other infections. In the recent past, there has been diminishing focus and funding for TB and HIV/AIDS globally. Gladys' sad story reminders policy makers and development workers that perhaps it is premature to reduce funding to TB/HIV/AIDS because it still remains a very big health and development problem especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. It is also a wake up call for parents especially mothers to take an HIV test and also take appropriate action e.g. PMTC to prevent infection to their unborn child. Perfect health is the greatest gift that a mother can give to an unborn child and infant. It is indeed sad that Gladys has only discovered that she is HIV positive when she has already developed full blown AIDS. If this teenager's status was known earlier through appropriate action of her guardians the health problems are now affecting her may have been prevented or minimised. Mable whose status was known earlier is in better health because of ART treatment but her elder sister's life hungs in the balance given the current shortage of TB drugs in Mazabuka.
