PATNA: An ostracised HIV/Aids patient committed suicide by setting himself on fire in the eastern state of Bihar, reports said yesterday. The man immolated himself in a village in southern Jamui district on Saturday. “The family used to go without food due to poverty and he was treated badly by the villagers,” a relative said. The immediate provocation for the drastic act was reportedly a quack doctor who said his days were numbered. The man had been suffering from high fever, cough and weakness since his return from Kolkata last year. “He became skinny and could not walk properly,” said a villager.Like millions of migrant workers who leave home in search of better prospects, he too had gone to Kolkata two years ago to earn a livelihood.He contracted the virus in Kolkata, and his wife got it from him, health officials said.According to official figures, 1,100 people among Bihar’s over 83mn population are infected with the virus, but Aids campaigners claim the figures are underreported.
The suicide underscored the discrimination faced by HIV-positive and Aids patients in India, which health experts blame on a low level of awareness and a stigma attached with the pandemic. This is despite that fact that India has the largest population of HIV-infected people globally, accounting for 5.7mn of the 39.5mn HIV/Aids cases worldwide. HIV-positive people in India often face discrimination at their workplaces, have been rejected by families, spouses and communities and in many cases are refused medical treatment at hospitals and clinics. In February, a woman suspected of having contracted HIV was beaten to death by her in-laws in the eastern state of Orissa. A month later, a woman in the western state of Gujarat set herself and her two-year-old son on fire after finding out her husband was HIV-positive. Meanwhile, at least 29 different civil society groups, including people living with HIV, have formed an alliance in Assam to jointly fight HIV/Aids that has assumed epidemic proportions in the northeastern region.“The need for a common platform of civil society groups, non-governmental organisations, media, trade unions, and people living with HIV, is to address various issues from removing stigma to accessing care and treatment, besides allowing people with HIV/Aids to live a life with dignity,” Jahnabi Goswami, president of the Assam Network of Positive People (ANPP), said.Goswami, 30, is one of the few women in India fighting to raise awareness about the disease and one of an even smaller number to have publicly declared in 1999 that she is HIV-positive. – Agencies
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