Access To Life Narratives
Print this pageHaiti - Jonas Bendiksen
Jonas Bendiksen spent time mainly in the Central Plateau of Haiti. Haiti accounts for the largest HIV burden in the Western hemisphere. Although one of the poorest countries in the world, wracked by violence and instability, Haiti is making steady progress in providing antiretroviral therapy to people in need. Despite the enormous logistical challenges—most roads outside the capital Port-au-Prince become impassable during rains—“accompagnateurs” (treatment partners) often walk hours, twice a day, to ensure that patients in their care take their medicine on time.
India - Jim Goldberg
Jim Goldberg’s experience of India was shaped by poverty, class, and the pervasive presence of stigma about HIV. Goldberg spent time in Andhra Pradesh, the region with one of the highest HIV rates in the country. India’s AIDS epidemic has been fuelled mainly by unprotected sex between sex workers, their clients, and their respective partners. This puts women at particular risk of being infected by their husbands, and it drives a rise in the transmission of HIV from mother to child. In some parts of India, the sharing of needles (from injectable drugs or legal pharmaceuticals) is also playing a major role in spreading the virus.
Mali - Paolo Pellegrin
Paolo Pellegrin found that in Mali, stigma against HIV is still so strong that many people refused to be photographed outdoors. The challenge of preventing transmission is compounded by a tradition of polygamous marriage, yet efforts to prevent and treat AIDS have expanded rapidly. Living far from the capital, Bamako, is no longer an obstacle as health centers are now able to provide free testing and antiretroviral treatment throughout the country.
Peru - Eli Reed
Eli Reed traveled to the central Amazon region to follow the lives of several people living with HIV. In Peru, men who have sex with men, transvestites, and commercial sex workers are the groups hardest hit by the disease. Stigma and ignorance—about sexual orientation or simply about HIV—make living a normal life impossible for those infected by HIV and prevent many people from testing for HIV for fear of persecution if it is known that they are positive.
Russia - Alex Majoli
Alex Majoli found that in St. Petersburg—one of the cities in Russia where antiretroviral treatment is now widely available the treatment is effective, but it often only addresses a part of the problem. In Russia, drug use and alcohol have taken a terrible toll on the young population. Like most Russians infected with HIV, the four people Majoli photographed were infected by shared needles. “HIV in Russia is a disease caused by social unrest and economic depression,” says Dr. Olga Leonova of the St. Petersburg AIDS Center. “Much has to be done to solve those people’s social problems. And something has to be done about curbing injected-drug use. Young people keep dying.”
Rwanda - Gilles Peress
Gilles Peress returned to Rwanda for the first time since photographing the immediate aftermath of the 1994 genocide. He spent time with people enrolled for antiretroviral treatment in the capital, Kigali, as well as in rural areas. Rwanda has made rapid progress in reaching a high proportion of those who need AIDS treatment, yet still faces a serious challenge in the number of children orphaned by war or AIDS.
South Africa - Larry Towell
Larry Towell visited Swaziland and South Africa, the region of the world hardest hit by HIV/AIDS. Because of AIDS, both countries are facing dramatic social and medical challenges.
South Africa remains the country with the highest number of infected people in the world. As in much of sub-Saharan Africa, the face of AIDS is more and more a female one, and in some areas, South African women are three times as likely than men to be infected. Stigma and taboo still make many South Africans reluctant to even talk about AIDS, let alone take HIV tests or seek treatment. However, after many years of reluctance, the South African government is now rolling out large treatment programs and this is beginning to reduce the fear and stigma linked to AIDS.
Swaziland - Larry Towell
Larry Towell visited Swaziland and South Africa, the region of the world hardest hit by HIV/AIDS. Because of AIDS, both countries are facing dramatic social and medical challenges.
Swaziland has the highest rate of HIV infection in the world, with one in every four adults infected (one in every three women). Swaziland is surrounded by South Africa and Mozambique, and a large part of the Swazi population works in South Africa, fueling the epidemic, since migrant and transport workers have the highest HIV infection rates. An estimated 110,000 children have lost one or both of their parents to AIDS. HIV/AIDS is impacting every aspect of life in Swaziland, though stigma and taboos are still powerful deterrents to preventing and testing for HIV.
Vietnam - Steve McCurry
The people portrayed by Steve Mc Curry live in Thai Nguyen and Phu Tho provinces, rural areas west and north of Hanoi. Although the percentage of Vietnam’s population infected with HIV is relatively low, the number of people infected has more than doubled in the past six years, making this one of the world’s fastest-growing epidemics. Most people living with HIV were infected through sharing needles for drug use. Injectable drugs like heroin are cheap, and casual use of these drugs is more common than in most other countries. With HIV easily spread into the general population via sex between drug users and their partners, AIDS is a problem the Vietnamese government takes seriously.
