At 22 years old, Matilde Alfiado and her friends aren’t afraid to ask for condoms. In the northern Mozambican costal village of Vilanculos, HIV/AIDS prevalence has reached 12.5% and general understanding of HIV is low. But Matilde learned first hand of its seriousness and its devastating potential. It was just a few months ago when she first arrived to the Vilanculos Rural Hospital with a skin infection that had spread from one of her legs, to almost her entire body. She felt sick, with a cough and diarrhoea that had lasted for weeks.
The hospital, supported and funded through CARE’s HIV intervention programme, was able to treat her symptoms and perform blood tests. Turns out, the skin infection and other problems were a result of her weak immune system do to her infection with HIV. Within a week the clinic was able to start her on anti-retroviral medications to boost her immune system against the opportunistic infections she presented. The prevalence of HIV/AIDs in this area of Mozambique has a history of misinformation combined with misunderstanding of transmission realities.
CARE is working to address these needs in a new, comprehensive program called Mais-Vida, meaning more life in Portuguese. The program includes counselling and education for the needs of the patients, and support to the healthcare system of Mozambique by training and educating government staff for early recognition of the symptoms of AIDS and in the various precautionary measures available.
The Mais-Vida mobile clinic services reach even the most remote areas, and the people who cannot make the trip to the hospital themselves. To date, with the support of CARE’s interventions, the hospital has more than doubled the number of identified HIV cases in the three districts included in the program, and has trained 92 healthcare workers on identification, treatment and follow-up of HIV/AIDS and the common secondary infections.
Since her first visit to the Vilanculos Rural Hospital, Matilde has become an advocate for diagnosing and treatment of HIV. “I tell my friends and family to come to the clinic to get tested. I’ve brought my mother, sister and 6 year-old daughter - and all of their tests have come back negative.”
Matilde is well aware that the education and the medicines she is receiving from CARE and the Hospital have saved her life. “I don’t know what I would have done if the clinic was not here”, she says, “I was so sick and my family didn’t have any way to help me.”
Now she comes regularly to the clinic for support, counselling and medicine to keep her immune system strong. She has no re-occurring signs of the infection now and has gained 11kilos since she first came to the hospital. “This is one of our main indicators that the medications are working,” says CARE project director Doctor Giwa “I was here when Matilde first came into the hospital, she was thin and covered in a skin infection, the anti-viral medication cleared up her secondary symptoms and allow her the opportunity to enjoy her life.”
Matilde’s weight gain is not the only indicator that she is enjoying her life again, you can see it in her shy smile. The aptly named Mais-Vida program has given her a chance to live more, and she now knows how to protect herself and others from the spread of HIV/AIDS and maybe most importantly, she is sharing what she has learned with her friends.