The cat has a death wish
Just after recovering from his snake bit or whatever, Jambo appeared on morning with a really nasty dog bite on his hip. It was really gross as you could see the bone underneath! Jonathan went straight to the vet (again!) who prescribed this purple antibiotic spray thing. It has to be sprayed on the wound twice a day. Jambo being a cat ends up licking it all away, having a purple mouth and purple from the other end too! He is not really improving and now I think he is getting ill from licking the spray so often! It is not Thursday and we are leaving on Sunday. Jambo is perhaps staying alone in the house for a week until he goes to his new home but now I don’t know what to do with the poor cat! Hopefully he will make a remarkable recovery and be fine to live alone! Watch this space!
Is this the right incentive?
The government has just started a new scheme for all of its employees who are HIV positive. They are to be given an extra K5000 per month in their salaries. Bearing in mind that the average teacher earns K12,000 a month and a cleaner probably only gets K4000 this is a huge increase for some. So is the government working along the right lines?
I’m in two minds about it. Firstly it does mean that more people will go and get tested which is good as they will know their status and can adapt their behaviours so suit (hopefully) and they can get proper treatment so they will live longer. We know many people who are positive and the extra money will really help them live better lives. BUT the scheme already has many problems – corruption being the main one. People are actually pretending that they are positive just to get the money. Also does it make is cool to have HIV? I’m not sure. On a plus it may reduce the stigma attatched to HIV. Government statistics for teachers still do not recognise that people are dying from AIDS, instead for cause of death of a teacher they list many illnesses and have a box for other!
HIV/AIDS still remains a HUGE problem for Malawi even with all of the projects and programmes in place. More of that later!
Other news:
Moving house tomorrow and then heading to Uganda on Sunday so probably no more entries until I come back in 3 weeks.
Enjoy
Caroline
Is this the right incentive?
The government has just started a new scheme for all of its employees who are HIV positive. They are to be given an extra K5000 per month in their salaries. Bearing in mind that the average teacher earns K12,000 a month and a cleaner probably only gets K4000 this is a huge increase for some. So is the government working along the right lines?
I’m in two minds about it. Firstly it does mean that more people will go and get tested which is good as they will know their status and can adapt their behaviours so suit (hopefully) and they can get proper treatment so they will live longer. We know many people who are positive and the extra money will really help them live better lives. BUT the scheme already has many problems – corruption being the main one. People are actually pretending that they are positive just to get the money. Also does it make is cool to have HIV? I’m not sure. On a plus it may reduce the stigma attatched to HIV. Government statistics for teachers still do not recognise that people are dying from AIDS, instead for cause of death of a teacher they list many illnesses and have a box for other!
HIV/AIDS still remains a HUGE problem for Malawi even with all of the projects and programmes in place. More of that later!
Other news:
Moving house tomorrow and then heading to Uganda on Sunday so probably no more entries until I come back in 3 weeks.
Enjoy
Caroline
posted by Caroline Pitcairn at
12:18 pm
1 Comments:
Hey Caroline
Glad to hear everything is going well with you if not with poor Jambo. Hope you enjoy your travels. Take care
Pam
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Anonymous, at 9:20 pm
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