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![This photo was published in 2008 jointly by UNAIDS and Asia Pacific Leadership Forum (APLF) in publication entitled "SOUTH ASIA PORTRAITS OF COMMITMENT Why people become leaders in AIDS work" (ISBN 978-974-7512-94-6) available from
http://www.aplfaids.com/documents/SA_Portraits_book.pdf pp36-38 Description used there
Sisters Nirmala Mulackal, 60, and Usha Saldanha, 42, both
nurses, give “missionary zeal” a humorous and worthy hand.
They belong to a unique group of nuns, the Sisters of Charity
of Nazareth. Based in America, the Charity’s mission is “to go
where others dare not”. AIDS care was an obvious destination,
particularly in Bihar, one of India’s poorest states. The Sisters of
Charity came to Bihar to set up medical care in 1947. In 2004,
they began caring for AIDS patients in their rural Nazareth hospital
and opened the state’s only Community Care Centre (CCC)
specifically for AIDS patients.
In partnership with the Bihar State AIDS Control Society, the CCC
provides in-patient treatment for opportunistic infections, family and
individual counselling, exercise and meditation, and livelihood
training. The hospital serves as a training centre for nursing
students. It provides basic hospital care, a general out-patient
clinic and outreach service through community health centres in
40 villages, including Voluntary Counseling and Testing [VCT]
opportunity. The Sisters also run empowerment programmes through
women’s self-help groups they have established. They have a team
of lay people performing dramas in villages to create awareness
on various diseases and a core team of seven nuns who visit
colleges, companies and factories to talk about AIDS and other
health issues. The entire staff has participated in exposure training
programmes in other hospitals to better care for AIDS patients.
They offer legal rights education to people living with HIV and
provide them monthly food rations, in partnership with the World
Food Programme. The Sisters dream of setting up a mobile clinic
to operate along the national highway and of obtaining reliable
supplies of antiretroviral drugs and other critical AIDS drugs. The
hospital has admitted more than 850 AIDS cases over the past
three years.
Acknowledgements
Karen Emmons interviewed all the people profiled
and produced the text of this book.
All photographs are the joint copyright of Shahidul Alam and UNAIDS.
Some of the photos of this book were also published on www.unaids.org
http://www.unaids.org/en/resources/presscentre/featurestories/2008/october/20081006southasiaportraits/
http://www.unaids.org/en/resources/multimediacentre/photos/unaidsphotogalleries/2008/20081006portraitsofcommitment/](http://medialibrary.unaids.org/media/image?src=blank_image.gif)
