Getting Drugs and treatment to those in need:
It took 10 years before anti-AIDS drugs were made available to people in East & Southern Africa. Now that they are here, The Rose Project has many projects to ensure that people can access them, and that they receive the nutrition their bodies need to take them.
As many as 20 million people in East & Southern Africa have lost their lives unnecessarily as a result of AIDS.
Antiretroviral drugs (ARV's) became available in the West in 1994. But it wasn't until 2001 that the first drugs became available to people in the Southern hemisphere, principally due to the excessively high costs. In Kenya the first drugs became available in December 2003 and in Malawi mid-2004.
Life saving drugs were available for 10 years in the west before they were made available to people who needed them in East & Southern Africa.
This is because pharmaceutical companies refused to relax the patent rights and allow pharmaceutical companies in the developing world, to make cheaper (generic) drugs.
In 2001, the South African government took a case against the 39 major pharmaceutical companies, (Big Pharma) in the US. Due to the bad publicity for Big Pharma, shareholders instructed them to withdraw the case and soon after, the life saving Anti Retroviral Drugs (ARV's) gradually became available in developing countries.
The pharmaceutical companies must be blamed for those many lives that were lost. They were hiding their patents in order to reap a lot of profits from their business of selling the antiretrovirals." - Rowlands G Lenya, Founder of TAPWAK (The Association of People Living with AIDS in Kenya)
A child friendly ARV drug has been very slow to become available because few children in rich countries have the virus.
The paediatric version of the AIDS drugs is still not available in many developing countries.
The principal obstacles in reaching people with treatment and care are the lack of doctors and nurses and healthcare facilities.
How we have helped:
2006: The Rose Project opened The Lighthouse Clinic: a HIV and AIDS clinic in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi
2007: The Rose Project opened a new community healthcare centre in Nakuru, Kenya. The centre cares for families and orphans affected by the virus in one of the poorest regions. This is where Rose's family continue to live.
2007: The Rose Project opened a new maternity wing, an addition for the existing healthcare centre in Muhoroni, Kenya. At the centre prevention of mother to child transmission treatment and care is provided.
October 2009 Dr. Mary Robinson opened the new Rose Project funded maternity hospital. This is the principal maternity hospital in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi. It is home to 13,000 births per year. By comparison, the National Maternity Hospital in Dublin has 9,000 births per year. The principal obstacle to delivering clinical care is the acute shortage of doctors and nurses. There is only one qualified obstetrician and 3 midwives for the hospital.
October 2009: The Vice- President of Malawi, Dr. Joyce Banda, opened a new healthcare wellness centre for healthcare workers in Lilongwe. Due to the burden of care which has been created by HIV, many healthcare workers need support in different areas e.g. health, social, finance. This centre aims to provide this. The centre will also provide treatment and care to healthcare workers who have become infected in the workplace or who have otherwise succumbed to the virus. .
The Rose Project also funds salaries and training for medical and nursing staff in Uganda, Kenya and Malawi.
You can help. Take action now.
The Rose Project supports people affected by HIV or AIDS in Eastern & Southern Africa. It provides medical, nursing and pyscho-social care. It is named after Rose Atieno, a young Kenyan woman who was estimated to have been the 16 millionth person to die of AIDS.
Find out about projects funded by The Rose Project.
