Helping a forgotten minority: Disability and HIV/AIDS in Zambia
13 June 2007
Image
courtesy of ZNAN
It is a sad fact that, if you are disabled and live in a developing country, you are less likely to receive information about HIV and AIDS, and will find it harder to get hold of condoms. Poor people with disabilities are all too often neglected by medical services, with few healthcare workers being skilled in sign language, for example, or trained in meeting other special needs.
In Zambia, where around 100,000 people live with a disability, DFID is working
to change this situation. By providing financial and technical support to the Zambia
National AIDS Network (ZNAN), the
National AIDS Council and a number of
disabled people’s organisations, DFID is helping to ensure that a vulnerable
group receives the special care it needs – which could mean the difference
between life and death for many thousands of Zambians.
Disability: no barrier to a better life
Image courtesy of ZNAN
Susan Mshoka is in her early 30s and has been deaf since childhood. A widowed
mother of two, she has publicly declared herself to be HIV positive.
In 2004,
when her health began to deteriorate rapidly, Susan became unable to continue
working. With her children to support and her condition worsening as money
became scarcer, there seemed to be little hope for Susan. Compounding these
difficulties was Susan’s deafness: how could she find the help she needed when
basic communication was such a struggle?
Thanks to the support of the
Zambian Federation of the Disabled (ZAFOD),
however, the future is now much less bleak for Susan and her family. ZAFOD uses
DFID funds, channelled through ZNAN, to provide HIV and AIDS-related activities
for people with disabilities. In Susan’s case, this has meant the provision of
anti-retroviral therapy, which helps to slow the progression of HIV and AIDS,
and which has made her healthy enough to return to work.
And work is another area in which ZAFOD has given Susan a boost, enabling her to
participate in an innovative income generation programme that supplies pay-phone
services to local communities. Through this initiative, Susan makes a profit by
operating a pay-phone in an area which has little access to telephones, and she
can also earn commission by selling mobile phone credit.
By restoring her to health, and helping her to become economically independent, ZAFOD has given Susan the chance for life that, because of her disability, she might well have missed out on.
Sharing knowledge and delivering the goods
With the support of the DFID Civil Society Fund, ZAFOD is working to ensure that disabled people are not excluded from the HIV and AIDS services that should be open to all. To this end, it has provided sign-language training for HIV and AIDS counsellors, and supplied mobility aids, such as wheelchairs, to the physically disabled, and hearing aids to the hard of hearing.
ZAFOD has also
sought to improve food security through the provision of essential items such as
seeds and other "inputs" to farmers, and has helped disabled people to turn a
profit in commercial endeavours like bee keeping and fish farming. Fundamental
to ZAFOD is a "sustainable livelihoods" approach, which recognises the
importance of giving people the means to sustain, by themselves, a good quality
of life.
Disabled people in Zambia stand to benefit too from DFID's support for the
National AIDS Council. Through a package of funding and technical assistance,
DFID is helping the Council to coordinate its work on disability, and
strengthening the sharing of information on this subject. A group who have for too long been a
forgotten minority are now being noticed, and real lives - like those of Susan Mshoka and her family - are being turned around as a result.
Key Facts
- A
- It is estimated that one in six Zambian adults lives with HIV. The Zambian national HIV prevalence rate among adults aged 15 to 49 is almost 16%, with 18% of women and 13% of men infected countrywide.
- DFID Zambia is committed to supporting an effective HIV and AIDS response. Although around 60% of DFID Zambia’s resources will go though the National Treasury in the form of General Budgetary Support, much of the remaining funds will be channelled through flexible funding instruments and civil society. DFID Zambia has committed £3.9 million to the Civil Society Fund for the period May 2004 to May 2009. Of this, £1.9 million is being channelled through ZNAN as accountable grants for projects such as ZAFOD.
- The Civil Society Fund is being managed and administered by the international health consultancy
- ZNAN is a network of civil society organisations working together to effectively respond to the challenges of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in Zambia. ZNAN does this in collaboration with government, cooperating partners and other stakeholders. ZNAN also disburses accountable grants on behalf of the
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