The Rwandan Association of People with AIDS, RRP+, thanks the government for giving them antiretroviral drugs, which they now have the same life expectancy as other Rwandans in general.
A study by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2022 and the General Census conducted by NISR that year show that the life expectancy among Rwandans now reaches 69.6 years, up from 49 years in the year 2000.
At that time, those infected with HIV were in serious danger and were given room number 4 at CHUK Hospital, where they were taken out to be buried because they did not receive antiretroviral drugs.
According to RRP+, it was in 2003 that a campaign and advocacy began to find medicines for its members, causing the deaths that would have cost the lives of many, until now many of them are still alive.
One of the leaders of RRP+ in the Eastern Province, says that before that year 2003, a person knew that he was infected with HIV and became depressed, which would add to the lack of ability to buy anti-retroviral drugs.
The director of RRP+ we decided to call Muyeyi Consolate says “There were those who sold cars, others sold land, but later they got sick in CHUK hospital, but now no one is suffering from AIDS, and no one has died from it.”
The mother said, “When you take the medicine properly, even if you are born with the virus, you get old, you spend many years to protect an old woman or an old man, because there are those who have been taking the medicine for more than 30 years.”
Mumyeyi says that there is a 60-year-old woman who lives in Rukomo Sector in Nyagatare District, who has been diagnosed with HIV for more than 30 years, and her survival is due to taking the medicine properly.
He says there is also a 22-year-old man who was born with HIV and is now studying at ’East African University’, thanks to his good medication.
The director at RRP+ says he himself found out he had HIV at the age of 22 and is now 44, and his life is as good as anyone else’s.
He has a husband and three children, one 25 years old, the other 23 years old, the other 13 years old, the two young people were born after they found out they had HIV, and the doctor helped them to be born without infection.
The mother says that their home is self-help, they live in a house they have built, they raise cows, she is a manager, a man is a businessman, and the development work is said to be ongoing.
The director of the Association of People with AIDS in Rwanda, says that those who have become accustomed to taking the medicine properly (one pill a day but an hour does not change), arrive at a time and find that there is no virus left in the body, especially those who have been on the medicine for 15-20 years.
However, when a person sleeps and stops taking medicine thinking that he has no problem, after about a week he does not take medicine and he used to take it well, he starts to float even more.
According to RBC, so far, more than 219 thousand people are taking HIV drugs, and 3% of all Rwandans in the country are infected with the virus.