News
HIV/AIDS
Pension rationing
Our initiative to inform the HIV/AIDS patients we have found
in the remote villages in Srikakulam District, about the
NEW ‘government pension for HIV+ people’, has
enabled Brighter Future to assist eleven more people to
apply for the pension. The pension is, however, rationed.
The applicant must have been taking antiretroviral treatment
for at least six months. Only 5000 pensions will be given
in each State. The population of Andhra Pradesh is 85 million
and is thought to have the third highest incidence of HIV/AIDS
in India.
Why not pensions for all HIV+ patients?
Patients on ARV treatment are more likely to be able to
work to supplement the 6kg of rice, 1kg each of wheat flour,
soya and lentils in the Brighter Future food and medicine
parcels. These are only a supplement and not enough to live
on for a month. They take little jobs like pot washing or
try to get daily labouring jobs on their ‘good days’.
HIV patients get sicker as the virus multiplies
in their bodies, progressing through five stages until people
are classified as AIDS victims. The progression can be delayed
by good diet, clean food, clean water and daily anti-bacterial
tablets.
Those widows who have lost the breadwinner and have no income,
are reduced to begging. many are too poor to afford the
bus fare to go for blood tests at the government centres
in the main town. They cannot afford the medicines that
would enable their bodies to combat fevers, sickness, diarrhoea,
and infections. They are more liable to get pneumonia (especially
children) and TB.They die of malnutrition.
A pension for all HIV patients who test
positive would enable them to eat and to get to treatment
centres.
ARV treatment also being rationed.The
availability of ARV treatment is also, in low and middle-income
countries, being rationed according to Hivweekly. International
donor countries and national governments are attempting
to cap the support for the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB
and Malaria. Already here in India the threshold for starting
ARV has been lowered since our children first started on
ARV treatment in July 2007. Using the cheapest drugs, which
in the West have been phased out as they have more side
effects than newer drugs, is also the part of this rationing.
India produces many of the generic ARV drugs sold on the
world market.
Our feeding programme came too late for
this little boy, Raja Rao. He died only three months after
we found him and took him into our Prem Nivas Hospice.
In addition to giving food parcels to those
who come to our Narasannapeta centre, Brighter Future goes
to the Srikakulam government’s ‘HIV Network
Office’ to deliver food parcels to the poorest people
on their register, and has another drop off point in a Srikakulam
leprosy colony for patients from villages to the south,
who cannot easily get to Narasannapeta.
Each parcel of food and medicines costs us £6.
Every month our survey finds more HIV households
who need help. Could you make a donation of £6
a month so that we can give a food parcel to another
of these innocent widows?
Contact Danny or Manya if you can help
- telephone 01233 612598 or 01284
719997
The Big Day is 11 July
For Danny and the seventeen intrepid volunteers to run in
the London 10 kilometre - the scenic route in centre of
London. Some are first timers like Danny (I was only joking
when I asked if he was going to do it!), others are running
for a second time. If you would like to support them, do
it through Justgiving at
www.justgiving.com/bfit/donate
or use the internet, or send a cheque,
made payable to Brighter Future International Trust, LloydsTSB
plc, ac no 3085385 sort code 30-90-28
It begins at 9.30am and the team will wear
Brighter Future Athletic vests. I am going to the finish
at Horsegaurds Parade to meet them.
Anna has
already passed her target to raise £1000 for Brighter
Future
Anna’s employers sent BFIT a cheque for £250
in support of Anna’s sky diving exploit, and she has
raised £1005 on her Justgiving site from friends and
well wishers. Anna is paying all her own costs for this
jump. Visit Anna’s Justgiving page and see the lovely
photos she has put on it:
www.justgiving.com/nanabellaskydive
We will be thinking of you on 30
July, Anna!
|
|
|
How
did we do in
May 2010?
Children sponsored 1
Donations and events
Sarah’s marmalade
and Caroline’s mice £50
Chantry Sale £535
Mr and Mrs Slingsby £20
Chepstow Jubilee Townswomen’s
Guild £35
Oberthur Technologies UK
Ltd (for Anna) £250
A F £20
Birthdays
July and
August birthdays
Prem
Nivas
Ramadevi
7 July
Sai Kumar Potta 8 July
Karun Kumar 28 July
Rainbow
Homes
Ruthu 1st
Arun kumar E 11
Satish D 10
Santosh K 10
Issak 21
Cards take about ten days
to reach India.
Please send birthday cards
and presents to
Brighter Future
Development Trust
PO Box 18
Plot 705 Vuda Layout Vizianagaram
Andhra Pradesh
India
535003
Donations
may be made to Brighter Future via internet, cheque or bank!
Brighter Future International
Trust
Sort code 30-90-28
Ac no. 3085385
or by Paypal and CAF on
our web site
www.brighterfuturetrust.com
|
|
The
New Building for HIV infected Orphans in Vizianagaram
The extension of the main Rainbow Boy's
Home, to make a completely self contained unit for 20 to
40 orphan children, is progressing. The extension comprises
a second storey on the house and a room on 'stilts'. The
roof is on and it is hoped to finish in time for the children
to enrol for the new school term in June.
We need about £5,000
to complete the project and will be grateful for any support.
Coffee mornings, the London 10K run, garden parties and
jumble sales will all help us build this home.
The cost of construction and raw material
are rising so quickly that Victor decided to make an extra
room on the ground floor now - as we wouldn't be able to
afford to do it in a year or two.
The Chantry Hotel Sale, which raised
about £530, will buy the wood for about 16 of the
22 windows we need in the new HIV+ Home in Vizianagaram
which will be called Jyothi House.
The New School
Year in Andhra Pradesh
This year there will be 62 children - 29 boys and 33 girls
- at private High Schools in Vizianagaram, from DMC House
and the Rainbow Boys' Home. Lots of uniforms and books to
buy, not to mention the admission fees and exam fees.
At Prem Nivas, Swathi, Ramadevi and Sai Km. Potta will be
starting the 10th year. That is the equivalent of our 5th
form, a year spent preparing for the national exams. Passing
them will take the children into the '6th form' or '10 plus
2' as it is called in India. Swathi and Ramadevi has been
having coaching in the holidays - at their request!
Also at Prem Nivas, Jyothi and Bangaru
will be joining the Gajapatinagaram Government High School,
thanks to the headmaster of a small village school 6 km
away from Prem Nivas. He allowed Bangaru and Jyothi to attend
his school, so they have now completed the 5th year of attendance
and tests, and can now enter the High School system.
Manohar from the Boys' Home also starts his 10th school
year at the Roman catholic Mission School in Vizianagaram.
A date for
your diary if you are within striking distance of Bury St
Edmunds.
on 5 June at 11am, Sonia and Richard
are having a Coffee Morning at 32 Maltings Garth. Thurston,
near Bury St Edmunds. Proceeds will be in aid of the Alzheimer’s
Society and Brighter Future.
Thank
you, Isobel!
Isobel is one of our newer sponsors. She
has very kindly set up a Facebook
page for Brighter Future International
Trust. Isobel is a friend of Kathryn and when Kathryn has
finished her globe-trotting, and paid a quick revisit to
the Rainbow Children and Prem Nivas, she will join Isobel
as an Administrator of the Facebook pages. I love the "adopt
a grandparent" idea Isobel!
Isobel wonders if those of you who
use Facebook would pass the Brighter Future page on to your
friends and colleagues. Lots and lots of pictures on it
too!.
|
