Wall of silence



Swaziland has equaled Botswana as the country with the highest HIV infection rate. The Botswana infection rate has stabilized as public health and education programs have begun to take effect, but Swaziland's rate has risen to 38.6 percent and is continuing its upward trend. Unlike Botswana, where education has begun to break through the wall of silence surrounding AIDS, HIV-positive people in Swaziland still suffer from stigmatization and denial:

As if to exemplify how unusual public disclosure remains, on Friday both the nation's daily newspapers carried front page stories about a woman who admitted she was HIV-positive status before the government's constitutional drafting committee.



"So long as we do not want to learn about HIV/AIDS, it will wipe us all out - and you are getting this from someone who has tested several times, and was proved HIV-positive," Buyile Mkhatshwa, a farmer's wife in rural Siphofaneni in the eastern Lubombo region, told the committee.



The committee was touring the region, collecting views from residents about the draft constitution proposed by King Mswati. Mkhatshwa pleaded for a constitution that would provide for children left orphaned when their parents died of AIDS. She was nearly shouted down by angry neighbours, who reportedly cried "Shame! Shame!" and demanded that she be removed from the gathering.

One public health worker commented that Swazis have become conditioned to view AIDS "as a moral failure" rather than a medical condition.