COMMENTARY: Ukraine faces growing challenge of HIV/AIDS (05/29/05)

COMMENTARY: Ukraine faces growing challenge of HIV/AIDS

by Alexander Kuzma

In its most recent annual report, a hospital in Dnipropetrovsk reports that 77 newborns delivered in its obstetrics ward were diagnosed positive for HIV. These are babies whose mothers unwittingly passed on their illness during delivery or through breast-feeding or in the womb. These are babies who will become orphaned at a young age. Without proper care, they are likely to be stigmatized by society, to be housed in orphanages that do not meet basic codes of human decency where they will eventually contract full-blown AIDS and die.

Seventy-seven may not seem like a large number, but it points to a very ominous trend as the AIDS epidemic spreads to the mainstream population in Ukraine. There was a time when AIDS was associated almost exclusively with intravenous drug users, prostitutes and homosexual men. Not any longer. AIDS has entered a new phase whereby even infants, for no fault of their own, face a very bleak future.

During his recent triumphant visit to the United States, President Viktor Yushchenko and the first lady of Ukraine made frequent mention of the looming AIDS crisis as one of the most serious challenges facing their nation. Probably not many in the diaspora took notice. It's time to wake up to the threat.

The United Nations warns that with the epidemic's current rate of growth, Ukraine could lose up to 40 percent of its population in the coming decades. According to the best estimates of the World Health Organization, nearly 500,000 Ukrainians, or more than 1 percent of the population, are already infected with the deadly virus.

To grasp the numbers, we need to visualize the mass of people who assembled on Kyiv's maidan (Independence Square) last December. At its peak, the crowd was estimated between 500,000 and one million souls. As horrible as it may be, we need to imagine the obliteration of a crowd that size to fully comprehend the peril that awaits Ukraine.

At the height of Ukraine's electoral crisis, all of us feared the worst. We prayed that the security police under President Leonid Kuchma's control and the Russian storm troopers exported by Russian President Vladimir Putin would not suppress the Orange Revolution with violence. Even the slightest provocation could have led to a repeat of the massacre at Tienanmen Square, or the violence we saw more recently in Uzbekistan. Yet the number of Ukrainians threatened by AIDS is exponentially greater than the 2,000 to 3,000 Chinese students who died when Beijing's democracy movement was crushed.

In many ways, our response to the AIDS crisis will be the greatest test of our diaspora's fidelity to Ukraine. It will be a harsh test of our commitment to its future.

AIDS is not a pleasant problem to confront. Many nations have been devastated by it because they failed to grasp its magnitude in its early stages. They indulged in denial until it was too late. In sub-Saharan Africa, AIDS has been a monstrous plague that has mowed down more human beings than even the horrific wars and civil strife that have torn apart this region.

The good news is that Ukraine can still avert the worst of this catastrophe, but only if the government, the Churches, non-governmental organizations, philanthropic institutions, medical associations and student groups mobilize at unprecedented levels. We have time, but precious little of it. Token assistance and symbolic gestures will not rescue Ukraine from this crisis.

This is a time to heed Taras Shevchenko's prophetic words: "I chuzhoho nauchaites, svoho ne tsuraites!" We must learn what is foreign to us; at the same time, we must not forsake our own.

Ukrainian health authorities and aid organizations can learn a great deal from countries like Brazil and South Africa that launched high-intensity campaigns against their own AIDS crises, saving hundreds of thousands of lives in the process. We also have a great deal to learn from the experience of American and European health authorities that have turned the corner and helped to level off new infections, even in their inner cities.

But the greatest obstacle to an effective response is the stigma and scorn that attaches to AIDS victims. It is much easier for polite society to turn its back on the destitute sick, leaving them to die out of sight and out of mind until the epidemic grows to such enormous proportions that it overwhelms the economy and the health system.

The urge to forsake our own - "tsuratysia" in Shevchenko's words - is extremely dangerous. During the early years of Ukraine's independence, many members of the diaspora felt ashamed and alienated from their kinsmen. Until the Orange Revolution, many felt justified in sneering at the inadequacies and vices of Ukraine's stereotypical "homo Sovieticus." Hopefully, those days are over. Now that we have seen the potential and the decency of Ukraine's progressive forces, we must not give in to shame and turn our backs on Ukraine as it struggles to curb the onslaught of AIDS. If it hasn't already, very soon this epidemic will threaten our cousins, our nieces, our nephews, our families. Our own.

From a Christian perspective, we need to remember that Jesus did not make it easy for us to "love your neighbor," to embrace our own. The mandate to heal the sick and to bring comfort to the afflicted applies as much to AIDS victims as it applied to lepers, hemophiliacs, sinners, despised Samaritans and other social pariahs 2,000 years ago. We do not get a pass just because this illness makes us feel uncomfortable.

Our Churches, our credit unions and medical associations have a special role to play in developing the resources needed to combat the pandemic. At a minimum, we need to help the Ukrainian government improve the quality of life in Ukrainian orphanages that will be straining under the weight of thousands more children filling their wards. And we need to reach out to Ukrainian youth to help them resist the high-risk behaviors that threaten their generation.

The diaspora could try to wash its hands of AIDS as somebody else's problem. But the West must bear some share of responsibility. According to a recent article in the Kyiv Post titled "The Summer Sex Boom," Western men continue to flock to Ukraine in search of trophy brides and sexual conquest. This unseemly spectacle only adds fuel to the epidemic's fire. AIDS was virtually unheard of in Ukraine before the collapse of the Soviet Union. Insulation from this disease may have been the only benefit of living in a closed society. The fact is that AIDS came to Ukraine from the West, and the West has a responsibility to help limit its ravages.

We can always play the role of the Pharisees. We can sit in judgment of our Ukrainian kin and pretend that the diaspora is all pure of heart and steeped in virtue. Or we can respond with a level of compassion and solidarity that the Sermon on the Mount demands.

Ukraine is at a crossroads. If we truly care about its future, we need to make a serious investment in the health programs, the hospitals and orphanages, and the social infrastructure the nation desperately needs. The young people who were in many ways the architects and the lifeblood of the Orange Revolution need our help. Their lives are still at stake, and we can help them avert a living nightmare.

Alexander Kuzma is executive director of the Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund.

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