When campaigners won a legal battle to force the state to treat pregnant women with HIV,the Cotlands centre had to find a new purpose. Bhekisisa reportsEvery Sunday the long, ebony cars rolled in. “For some reason our children tended to die over weekends, or ” recalls Sister Kethiwe Dube,a worker at the Cotlands children’s Aids hospice in Turffontein, Johannesburg.
In 2002, and deaths at the 70-bed hospice were at a peak: 87 infants passed absent – an average of more than seven a month. So many succumbed to Aids between 1996 and 2003 that three memorial walls were created for them in Westpark,one of Johannesburg’s largest cemeteries. [We've seen] a decline from more than 70000 infants being born with HIV in 2004 to less than 6000 in 2015 Related: A letter to an 11-year-stale Aids activist who shamed South Africa's president Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com