Johannesburg - In less than a month, Nkhensani Mavasa will be able to speak from her heart.
She will talk about the realities of living with a virus that has silently ravaged many in her community.
Mavasa will talk about the realities of her challenges, and those of others, in accessing life-saving medication.
She will talk of the problems of dwindling donor funding for programmes and challenge the dysfunction she has witnessed in public health institutions.
When the International HIV/Aids Conference returns to the country next month in Durban, she will hold nothing back.
Mavasa, the Treatment Action Campaign’s (TAC) national chairwoman, has been living openly with HIV for 12 years. She has been asked to speak at the conference’s opening ceremony, sharing a platform with local-born international actress Charlize Theron, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, among other luminaries.
And 16 years after the first conference was held in South Africa, one that led to a watershed moment in the global Aids response, Mavasa said her aim was to show that a lot still needed to be done – particularly in overcoming stigma and discrimination.
Speaking to Daily News sister newspaper, The Star on Wednesday, 38-year-old Mavasa said: “There is progress, but we’re still not there yet as a country… The government has adopted the 90-90-90 strategy but our health systems, particularly in my area of Giyani, Limpopo, are a disaster.
“Last week, I went to a health facility and there wasn’t even cough syrup. Many people living with HIV there default – not because they don’t want to take treatment, but because of stock-outs.”
The 90-90-90 strategy was formulated by UNAids, and adopted by South Africa. It means that by 2020, 90 percent of all people living with HIV will know their status, 90 percent of all people diagnosed with HIV will receive antiretroviral therapy and 90 percent of people on treatment will have viral-load suppression.
Mavasa continued: “The realities aren’t being looked at. People are doing a lot of work, especially in rural areas like Giyani, but there are too few of them doing it.
“There’s a shortage of health workers. You get to a clinic and there are no resources; we have dysfunctional systems and stock-outs. We are told we must celebrate the many strides made in HIV treatment in the country, yet the poorest of the poor are still dying out there.”
According to the TAC, the struggle against HIV/Aids is “far from over”.
“While 17 million people around the world are receiving ARV treatment, another 20 million people still lack access. In South Africa, only around half of the 6.8 million people who require treatment are receiving it. In 2016 alone, approximately 1 million people around the world will die needlessly of Aids-related illnesses. Each day, 6 000 people around the world newly acquire HIV,” the civil organisation said in a statement.
Mavasa said: “Governments must commit to ensure funding for the global Aids response, and commitments must be made with targets and time-frames.”