In Nyakabanda, a suburb in Nyarugenge District of Kigali City, a 23 year old woman, Mary Dusabe, is struggling to live normal after she was diagnosed the AIDS virus two years ago.
Dusabe is among several other women who struggle for a living by trying to save the town environment. They collect garbage from different homes in Kigali and transform it into a substance used for cooking – commonly known as charcoal.
They are grouped into an association called ACEN (Association pour la Conservation de l’Environnement) – whose members have kept clean many homes in Nyarugenge District.
It may arouse emotions to find women living with HIV/AIDS working together with other women to sustain their company’s work and their lives. Dusabe, mother of a still-infant-boy, wakes up very early in the morning and joins other women in collecting garbage from different homes around Nyakabanda. She leaves her jobless and HIV positive husband at home – only to return in the afternoon.
While the number of women and girls infected with AIDS has increased in every region of the World over the past two years, according to the Global Coalition on Women and AIDS, females aged 20-24 in Rwanda are reportedly five times more likely to be infected with HIV than males of the same age.
Dusabe is an example of several Rwandan women infected with HIV/AIDS who are generating some income despite the challenges that come with living with the virus.
She says that she used to be jobless, spending all day at home, staring at a man who she claims, brought her the virus – young as she was. But since last year, she has been earning Rwf 13000 ($23) a month from the ACEN association.
“The job is ok,” she said. “At least I earn a living with it.”
With this amount she earns every month – though very low compared to the cost of living in the city, Dusabe buys food, pays Rwf 3000 for a monthly house rent, and buys different necessities required at home.
Her son Gentil Niyigena is turning two in November. Unlike them, Dusabe and her husband say their son not HIV positive, adding that the challenge is giving him the best they can afford. The husband, Martin Uwanyuzabato, said they need to make sure he work out ways to ensure the child grows into somebody helpful to society.
“We won’t have any more children,” he said. “We will put all our efforts on this boy.”
Every morning, the couple goes to Kabusunzu Health Center for their doses of the life-saving antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). Dusabe explains that the drugs result into feeling weak at work if she has not eaten enough.
As gesture of support from other members of the association, Dusabe along with the other HIV positive women are given the task of just sorting the already collected sacks of garbage because they are too weak to do the actual collection.
Olive Kizanye is another of the members that are HIV positive. Despite living with the virus since 2004, she legally got married with her husband last December.
She says that the marriage means her kids would have a home in case she passed away. The husband has become her strongest confidant. He apparently told her they had to marry such that his family does not haunt her and the children if he was no more.
“We strengthened our love and relationship after knowing that we have the AIDS virus,” Kizanye said.
As other women deposited garbage and went back to different homes in Nyakabanda to collect more from dustbins, Kizanye and Dusabe stayed at the garbage bank to screen out materials they do not need like polythene bags.
The garbage is dried up and molded into charcoal using a special machine. They are too weak to go for garbage collection but their workmates allow them to do alternative jobs at ACEN. The biggest problem, according to Dusabe, is not having her own house. She envies the time there will be a home of her own and the family.
Available global figures show that women are the largest portion among people living with HIV. High prevalence among women is also not unique to Rwanda but worldwide particularly in poorer regions. Latest government figures show that up 55 percent of the 290,000 victims, are women.
This does not however mean women are not taking precaution to protect them. A UN report released in July said though young people in Rwanda are starting sex early in general, females taking longer compared to male age-mates. The percentage of young people aged 15-24 who had sex before the age of 15 is said to be at 13% among males and just 4 percent with the females.
Women are also said to the vulnerable group that is facing it very rough to live. Dusabe expresses happiness that she is working, but points out that there are several women in her neighbourhood who have nothing to bring them incomes.
According to the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) women living with AIDS have come out requesting for assistance to set up income-generating activities when they regain some energy after taking ARVs and eating enough.
While Rwanda’s AIDS Control Commission (CNLS) and its partners have kept encouraging those infected to start some income generating projects, it seems the way to go as these people need even more than normal people need to live. Government should ensure that the women are not left behind in this process.