29 May 2017

JEDDAH — The Saudi Charity Association for AIDS Patients (SCAAP) in Jeddah is struggling with its finances as many benefactors have abandoned the charitable organization.

This has curtailed the charity’s operations and only a smaller number of people now benefit from its food baskets program. The cash crunch is also threatening the running of the organization’s headquarters.

People behind SCAAP found themselves left with two options: pay the annual rent or get evicted by the building owner. Despite requests by the association to the Ministry of Labor and Social Development to provide an emergency subsidy, it is still on the waiting list, Al-Watan newspaper reported.

Executive Director of SCAAP Heba Salawi told Al-Watan, “The suffering of the beneficiaries has increased because no financial or food support is forthcoming. The number of donors have become very few lately and there is no support from the official bodies.”

She said the number of food baskets dropped to 140 a month, which is quite insufficient to cover all beneficiary families. “We cannot cover all the families due to a lack of financial resources. Only 250 families out of a total of 600 are currently benefiting from the food baskets,” she said.

Salawi pointed out that the rest of the families do not get any financial or food support.

She said the food baskets come from donors, and because of the negative stereotype associated with HIV patients, society will not accept them. “People have misconceptions about the disease being contagious. Even donors request not to record their name and data because of the social stigma. Some people refuse to provide assistance saying people with HIV do not deserve any support,” Salawi said, adding that SCAAP is on the verge of collapse.

She explained that the association seeks to start several programs to help people living with the disease. These include finding partners for those among them who want to marry so that they can lead a stable life.

She revealed that the number of male patients who visit the association frequently is higher than the number of female patients. “Because HIV patients can only marry people who have the same disease for fear of transmitting the disease, our doctors and nurses try to find suitable partners for our patients outside the organization,” she said.

Social worker Basima Abdel Aziz told Al-Watan that there are pre-employment procedures, including the applicant being subjected to tests.

“This has become an obstacle for people living with HIV/AIDS. If an individual is diagnosed with AIDS, he or she is rejected by both the government and private sectors. In case an employer discovers a positive diagnosis, he fires the employee although a patient living with HIV and continuing treatment is a normal person who can work and produce like all other people,” said Abdel Aziz.

“Pre-acceptance medical tests for a new employment should be limited to certain jobs. When an employee who works in a restaurant, for example, discovers that he or she is HIV positive, then they can be relieved from his work. As for administrative work, I don’t see why they can’t continue work because they don’t pose any risk of infection to others,” she added.

“Most members of the community still do not know how the HIV virus is transmitted. This leads to a strong fear of patients with HIV. Earlier, there was an agreement with the labor office to send a letter to the employer and then the patient gets employed. The rules and regulations in the ministry and other government bodies need to be reviewed because HIV patients are in fact victims,” Abdel Aziz said.

She said training programs need financial support in order for AIDS patients to develop skills so that they can earn a living or to have access to an income source to support their families. However, the association is currently not in a position to support any training program, she added.

© The Saudi Gazette 2017