Reflections On World AIDS Day – Our Global Dilemma
What does America’s economic recession have to do with a school teacher in Kenya? A lot more than you realize. If there’s one thing I learned at the World Bank’s World AIDS Day event yesterday, it’s that our lives, economies, and health are all inextricably intertwined on a global scale.
Beldina Atieno (second from the left in the photo) traveled all the way from Nairobi to offer her first hand account of life as an HIV+ school teacher in Africa. Ms. Atieno’s story was both heart-wrenching and eye-opening. She was first diagnosed after her youngest daughter became very ill from an opportunistic infection, which prompted HIV testing in both daughter and mother. After discovering that they were both positive, she was abandoned by her husband and was plunged into poverty and despair. Read more »