Every day is a fight to survive for Africans who have AIDS
Friday, August 6, 2004 at 12:38PM
TheSpook
A bottle of Dark and Lovely hair gel in hand,
Kassim Issa pushes his withered body down a dirt path through Nairobi's
biggest slum, peddling a few ounces at Mama Washington's and other
tumbledown salons. For Issa, Dark and Lovely is life. The 20-cent
profit from one bottle can pay for an injection to dull the chronic
pain of AIDS. Two bottles can pay for a hospital visit. And selling 10
means he can afford a chest X-ray. "I am fighting every day to stay
alive," Issa said. "Every day I live, I win."In sub-Saharan Africa,
where half the people survive on less than a dollar a day, life is a
struggle for food, clothing and shelter. Issa and 28 million other
Africans stricken with HIV and AIDS face the extra burden of finding
and paying for treatment. Nearly 7 percent of Kenya's 32 million people
are living with the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS.
The epidemic claims the lives of 700 Kenyans each day. Across the
continent, 3 million people died of AIDS-related illnesses last year. [more]
Article originally appeared on (http://brownwatch.com/).
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