Bracelet of Hope to end one nation's AIDS pandemic

phyllistsang — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:09:04 +0000

Dr. Anne-Marie Zajdlik opens a Place of Hope in Lesotho

"Are you going to help the people who are [HIV] positive?" A South African crossing guard at South Africa’s border asked Dr. Anne-Marie Zajdlik on her way to Lesotho, a landlocked nation surrounded by South Africa, where her HIV treatment clinic is located.

"You bet I am," Dr. Anne-Marie Zajdlik, a mom, a family doctor, a McMaster alumni, and HIV/AIDS activist, recorded in her journal, "all 300,000 of them."

Her battle against the global HIV pandemic, which brought her to Lesotho, began in Canada.

Dr. Anne-Marie Zajdlik attended McMaster medical school after studying three years at University of Guelph in Biomedical Science and Human Biology. In 1987, during her second year at McMaster, Zajdlik studied an elective in Infectious disease at Dalhousie University in Halifax and worked with a team that was treating the first HIV-positive patient on the east coast.

"He," referring to the first HIV-positive patient, "was left by his partner, disowned by his family, and deserted by medical staff," Zajdlik remembered, "nurses were afraid, even cleaning staff wouldn't go into his room."

At that time, Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine, a 3000 pages textbook used by medical students, internists and junior doctors, only had a paragraph on HIV. Stigma, fear, and a lot of unknown surrounded the then 6-year-old incurable disease.

" I was quite moved by his isolation," Zajdlik said. She spent hours sitting at his bedside talking to him. The depth of his pain, his incredible strength, and his will to survive inspired her to go back and study more.

bracelet of Hope

Bracelet of Hope to end one nation's AIDS pandemic