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Robin Muchetu, Senior Reporter
MORE than 250 children on Antiretroviral Therapy at Mpilo Central Hospital in Bulawayo last year defaulted on taking the life-saving drug, an official has said.
The director of the Million Memory Project Zimbabwe, an organisation based at the central hospital’s Opportunistic Infections (OI) section, Mr Trevor Chirimbambowa said most of the children do not know that they were on ART because their parents were not telling them the truth.
“For 2017 alone we had 255 young people and children who defaulted from treatment and that is alarming because even just one child for us is a cause for concern. This figure is for our records at Mpilo alone. Other hospitals and clinics have their own numbers too,” he said.
Mr Chirimbambowa said the high numbers were a result of children who are told lies about their HIV status.
“Parents lie to children and say they are asthmatic or have kidney problems so they have to take drugs. As the child grows and they feel fine they do not take the drugs and this leads to them defaulting and having health complications. This is not fair to the children who do not know their status,” he said.
He suggested that parents must start introducing the subject of HIV to their children around seven years and fully disclose to them at 10 years. Mr Chirimbambowa said some parents do not even have information about HIV/Aids, hence cannot fully articulate the issue to their children. Telling the child the truth and conscientising teachers and pupils, he said, will ensure that there is no stigmatisation of the child. Parents and guardians are said to be torn between telling a child the truth or lying about health connections.
“This is the dilemma that some parents and guardians are finding themselves in as issues of disclosure come with various repercussions that they do not want to face. Some parents are just scared of the child’s reaction while some do not know where to start,” he said.
Some children, he said, are brought into Zimbabwe from South Africa and Botswana using omalayitsha and end up staying with grandparents who are also not aware of the children’s status. Mr Chirimbambowa said pill fatigue was also a major challenge for the young people.
“The child simply gets tired of taking ARVs every single day and they stop, they do not know the value of taking the life saving drugs because they are in the dark about their status. It is because the child has to take drugs twice daily which can be a burden especially when they do not know why they are taking the drugs,” he added.
National Aids Council (Nac) has also expressed concern about the numbers of defaulting children and young people.
Bulawayo Nac provincial co-ordinator Mrs Sinatra Nyathi said children should be told their HIV status.
“Parents should make an effort to disclose the HIV status of their children when they are still young, they must desist from telling lies as that comes with challenges. The child will no longer trust the parent who would have lied to him or her about their status,” she said.
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