In India, AIDS has long carried a social stigma unlike any other disease—largely because it’s associated with sexuality in a traditionally conservative culture. For decades, it was wrongly believed to be the result of immoral behavior, particularly infidelity. But how did India first learn about HIV/AIDS? Here is an interesting excerpts from an article published in Hindustan times.
The answer lies in the pioneering work of Dr. Suniti Solomon, whose groundbreaking research in 1986 changed the country’s understanding of the disease forever.
Then a young doctor, Suniti was testing 100 sex workers as a part of a research project at the Madras Medical College (MMC).
Little
did she known that a small, humble Madras laboratory’s preliminary
research would precipitate a medical challenge on a national scale.
“She
was shocked,” her son, Dr Sunil Solomon, recalled, 30 years on. “She
had told her research student that she didn’t expect to find anything,
that she was expecting negative results across the board.”
Instead,
what Dr Suniti found was that six of the 100 workers tested positive
for HIV/AIDS, an enormous discovery that brought the reality of the
virus home to India.
But not initially.
“The government
refused to believe the tests,” Dr Sunil said. “They could not believe
that a country like India – deemed to be cultural superior to the West –
could have the virus.”
It was only after the samples were sent to Washington and confirmed as positive that the government accepted Dr Suniti’s tests.
Facing
enormous opposition, the doctor would go on to establish the YR
Gaitonde Care Foundation in 1993 in Chennai (then Madras), and shape how
the country educated itself about the disease and treated those who had
it.
“Her discovery helped India start its fight against HIV/AIDS,” said
Dr Sekhar, a senior doctor responsible for anti-retroviral treatments
that help subdue the disease, at the General Government Hospital in
Chennai.
After Dr Suniti died last year, Sunil, a doctor in his own right, took over the foundation.
An understanding of the virus, Dr Suniti deemed three decades ago, was critical in helping treat those who suffered from it.
Dr Suniti’s sheer dedication to her patients came, perhaps, from some of their tragic fates.
One
of the first six people to be diagnosed was a 13-year-old girl who had
been abducted and sold into the sex trade. The girl volunteered at the
foundation the same year it started, dying a few months later.
But sympathy from the general public was in short supply.
“We
were thrown into jail, beaten by police, and called things like
impure,” said S Noori, president of the South Indian Positive network.
A
former sex worker, Noori was among the first to be diagnosed with AIDS
in India, and decided to volunteer to help raise awareness about HIV
after meeting Dr Suniti in 1987.
“Today, people look at homosexuals and transgenders with the same contempt they had for us sex workers back then.”
“Men
face an additional level of stigma because of the prejudice against
homosexuality,” Dr Sunil agreed. “And it’s worrying because it affects
their access to treatment.”
The main difference between then and
now, according to Noori, is how open people with HIV are. “People are
much more willing to come out and say I am positive,” she said, “And
that’s great because it shows that people’s attitudes towards it are
changing.”
It has been exactly 30 years since the first HIV
patient was diagnosed in India. In this time, the country has made
significant strides in medical treatment, thanks in large part to Dr
Suniti’s gargantuan efforts.
“What was a death sentence 30 years ago is now a manageable problem,” said Dr Sunil. “One pill a day and you’re good to go.”
The next big frontier that HIV/AIDS research needs to conquer is finding a cure.
But
of equal importance is continuing the fight that Dr Suniti Solomon
began – the struggle against the stigma that AIDS patients face.