Slum Ministry: HIV – AIDs

The scourge of the HIV and Aids pandemic continues to spread through Sub-Saharan Africa and ravages in a particular way those slum dwellers who cannot afford even basic health care let alone medicines and nutritious food necessary for Aids patients.

The Catholic Church has been responding to the HIV/AIDS crisis since the early 1980s when it first appeared in the South of Uganda. As the pandemic grew in Kenya, the Church was among the first groups to respond to the needs of those affected and infected.

The answer of the Catholic Church has been varied. St. Joseph the worker parish in Kangemi was one of the first ones to answer the needs of those affected. The small Christian communities took care of the sick patients, the Pastoral team visited them and helped them to die in Peace and reconciled with their families and neighbours. The youth from the Parish formed a drama through which it tried to create awareness among the population of the dangers of HIV/AIDs. The group was invited to many groups and organizations all around Nairobi.

The ministry for HIV/AIDs cares for those affected and infected, accompanies those who suffer on their journey of life while helping them face death in the light of Christ. Through the Christian communities, home-based care programs are spreading in many slums. These programs include distribution of food, care for the sick, counselling, accompaniment and care of orphans, paying their school fees and uniforms, searching for homes for them, etc.. but the Church works also at the prevention of the infection, through the "Youth Alive" groups and other groups creating awareness of the sickness and working at changing behaviour. .

It is the mission of this ministry to...

• Love and serve those affected and infected by HIV (families and friends).
• Heal fear, overcome isolation, and support basic human needs.
• Offer a closer communion with God and an active life in the Church - prayer, confession, communion, and healing services.
• Educate to eliminate injustice, ignorance, and discrimination.
• Advocate for health care, free medicines and other social services.

St. John Parish - Korogocho - Caring for People with HIV/AIDS
The context of appalling poverty and deprivation in Korogocho moved Medical Mission Sister Gill Horsfield to begin the Korogocho Programme. As in the case of MP, women bear the brunt both of poverty and HIV/AIDS in Korogocho. Caring for people with HIV/AIDS is one of the many ways in which Sr. Gill and many other sisters try to be a healing presence to those in need today.

Sister Gill Horsfield, a Medical Mission Sister, was already working in community-based health care in Korogocho, the poorest slum in Nairobi, when HIV/AIDS was first seen in 1989. In the slum, which is home to 150,000 people, she began training local health workers how to provide home-based care for those who were ill. This care included medical, pastoral, counseling, and social services.

The program has grown and become multi-faceted over the past 15 years. Sister Gill continues to train community health workers, and together they now care for over 1,000 persons with AIDS. The program's hospice is in continuous use, and one of its rooms has been turned into an IV Rehydration Unit.

"Every year about 200 of our patients in Korogocho die, nearly all of them as a result of AIDS. We accompany them as well as we can during their sickness and up to their death," explains Sister Gill. "In November, we have Mass for all our patients who have died … we remind ourselves that although these patients have all gone to heaven, they are there to care for us, and help us care for those who are still sick in the villages."

"We are seeing more child-headed households," says Sister Gill, who together with the health workers tries to give these caregivers, "some of the skills they need to cope with life, especially knowledge about how to care for young children and for a sick patient at home." 150 children attend weekly peer support meetings, where they receive guidance and a nutritious meal. Deaf and handicapped children receive special care.

Every day in Korogocho, meals are prepared and distributed to up to 55 families with someone who is ill. An additional 65 families receive dry food each week, to be cooked at home.

In 2004, Sister Gill received her home government's "Order of the British Empire" award for her over-20 years of primary health care service to the people of East Africa. She is one of dozens of Medical Mission Sisters with a direct involvement in caring for people with HIV/AIDS.

Korogocho Home-Based AIDs Care
Korogocho Home-Based AIDS Care Programme (Nairobi, Kenya) Korogocho Programme operates at the heart of Korogocho slum in Nairobi. It runs a double-room hospice, which also houses a feeding programme, and a 'Children Crisis Centre'. These structures are more modest in reality than their designations suggest.

This context of appalling poverty and deprivation of the Korogocho dwellers moved Medical Mission Sister Gill Horsfield to begin the Korogocho Programme. As in the case of MP, women bear the brunt both of poverty and HIV/AIDS in Korogocho.

This programme also relies on the help of a group of volunteers drawn from the local parish. They receive basic training in the care and accompaniment of the sick and dying. Predictably the majority of the volunteers are women.

The Korogocho Programme offers several points of interest relative to the institution called church. First, the programme grew out of a local parish church, and it continues to operate within that context. Second, the

Korogocho Programme is both a consequence of and a solution to the total failure of public social services in the area. In this kind of situation, the local church becomes the alternative source of healthcare and basic social services.

Third, the programme also offers pastoral care to PWA.
Sr. Gill describes the 'spirituality' of the Korogocho Programme as unconditional love and compassionate acceptance of PWA: 'No miracle drug will come in to alter this person's life, except the surprise of being loved.'

Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, HIV/AIDs Program
The Medical Missionaries of Mary Sisters are running the HIV/AIDs program in the parish.
The program is called HIV - RIARA Health Project and is based on Community Health-care services.
The main centre is on the compound of the Guadalupe Parish (Adam's Arcade), where there is a VCT Center to do the test and identify those infected who are then referred back to their village clinics. From the main Center at Guadalupe other "drop-in centres" in Kiberaare operated at Makina; Kianda; Katwekera; Kambimairu where a nurse goes regularly.

The community health workers help to identify the sick within the community. These helpers are volunteers, most of the from the small christian communities, and a few outsiders.The project does home-visiting of the critically sick.
There is also treatment in the Drop-in Centres on specific days, where the opportunistic infections among HIV infected people are treated. There is also counselling services and a social worker as most clients are poor and live in very difficult conditions. The Social Worker deals with the vulnerable orphans and helps them to come up with income-generating projects. There is also distribution of flour, as food is essential in the HIV pandemic.

The HIV- RIARA Centres network with AMREF and MSF, both of these organizations run important clinics in Kibera where the HIV-AIDs patients are treated free of charge when they are referred from the RIARA Centres. Those with symptoms of TB are referred to the D.O. Health Centre who deals exclusively with TB.

The personnel of RIARA does the follow-up to make sure that the patients take their medicine and to see how they respod to the treatment.
There is also a department to create awareness and give education on HIV to the general public and to the youth. This is done at Guadalupe Parish. The HIV-AIDs Education Department has two different programs: behaviour change and awareness. These programs target also the leaders as they can be influencial in the behaviour change.

Christ the King - Kibera - Care to HIV/AIDs Patients
The scourge of the HIV and Aids pandemic continues to spread through Sub-Saharan Africa and ravages in a particular way those people of Kibera who cannot afford even basic health care let alone medicines and nutritious food necessary for Aids patients.

Because Kibera is an "illegal" settlement, there are no government hospitals or clinics. The closest hospital is a forty-five minutes walk. People are forced to visit local private dispensaries, which are rarely staffed by trained medical personnel. There they can be treated for minor cases of colds, malaria and typhoid.