Yesterday, it was announced that 2 people in their 3rd week (of 3 weeks) of voluntary HIV testing and counseling (VCT) training were dismissed and sent back home - uncertified. They were community volunteers selected by a big NGO to be HIV testers in their communities and, therefore, needed to attend and pass the national VCT counselor course/exam. Turns out, that these married (not surprising) men were getting drunk every night and bringing prostitutes back to the hotel rooms where they were staying for training. They had been warned before, but they were dismissed on this 3rd offense for also getting the hotel guards drunk so that they could sneak past and get the prostitutes into their rooms. You know: nothing sets a behavioral example more than attending an HIV prevention course by day and sleeping with sex workers at night! At least if they were using condoms, there would be a positive silver lining on behavior change. No one checked these details.
Sometimes, I must admit, this place really gets under your skin. It’s not because I think that people in other places would not behave similarly. But, I do think that in the States we would have the decency to feel ashamed by it! Here, the 2 protested that these activities occurred on their time off! Luckily, that pathetic plea failed. Arghhhh.
Thank goodness it’s Friday.
Oh, you wanna talk demoralizing? The American guy who used to be in charge of CDC's Global AIDS Program in Uganda was also a total junkie who did all kinds of IV drugs and slept with prostitutes on the regular. Apparently CDC actually paid local Ugandan kids to come and wake the guy up for work. (I have a friend who used to work with this guy, hence the inside info.) I don't know if he had the decency to feel ashamed by his behavior; I guess most addicts are ashamed on some level…
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