A few excellent expatriates work on HIV at the centre of the country. There are also expatriates working on HIV in Myanmar who are just on the edge of the map. Here is one. One hopes that good people are not threatened with deportation as things change.
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World AIDS Day is Key to a Myanmar Ministry
Maryknoll Sisters
December 2011
World AIDS Day, December 1, is a special day for Sister Mary Grenough and the Myanmar AIDS victims she serves. She’s urging the country’s churches to plan unique activities like prayer services and special homilies.
Visits with “infected and affected people” in Myanmar also are helping show support for AIDS victims.
Sister Mary’s AIDS program, made possible by the contributions of Maryknoll donors and sponsors, enable people on the ground to get life-saving information into the hands of AIDS patients and caregivers, especially those in the remote areas of Myanmar’s mountains where doing so can be a challenge.
Sister Mary started the Myanmar Catholic HIV/AIDS Network to forge a connection among the country’s many AIDS patients. But reaching the country’s churches and social organizations with facts about AIDS can be hard if they’re not used to welcoming people with the disease. The group is slowly (but surely) changing Myanmar’s timeworn attitudes about AIDS.
In fact, Sister Mary, a trained nurse from Kentucky, just hired someone to help with the network’s latest effort: starting support groups for AIDS patients in Yangon’s Catholic community. Elizabeth was hired for the job as a “part-time volunteer” because she is uniquely qualified for the work. Elizabeth is HIV-positive.
Elizabeth’s husband died three years after they were married. He had AIDS and then passed it on to Elizabeth, who’s left with supporting a 12-year-old son. Meanwhile, Sister Mary’s group can only pay Elizabeth for two days of work per week, for which she’ll be paid less than $70 a month.
“We hope Elizabeth can help us to start support groups in the Yangon catholic community,” said Sister Mary. “She has excellent experiential knowledge of what it means to be HIV-positive and knows people and groups.”
Learn what else Maryknoll Sisters are doing to help AIDS victims through Maryknoll's Office for Global Concerns and find more reasons to support our work, both financially and in prayer.
Want us to pray for an AIDS victim you know? Post a request on our site’s prayer page.
http://www.maryknollsisters.org/catholic-mission/index.php/articles/607-world-aids-day-important-to-myanmar-ministry
