Community rights

When we talk about rights and responsibilities, do we really know enough? When we talk about gender relations, men’s and women’s responsibilities and vulnerabilities, and different power relations, do we understand enough of traditions and cultures? Should we not understand this before we talk about rights? Programmers and policy makers and researchers should be listening more to the communities they work in and asking for the solutions.

There is a balance to be found between the right to treatment, community support and decisions about who goes first. PLWHA and their communities are often excluded from discussions and decisions, despite the fact that they are directly affected by them. The right of these communities to be involved in the discussion is critically important to treatment decisions. It is important that positive people and their communities are at the forefront of prevention and treatment strategies and that they are linked into networks. These are fundamental moral issues and major efforts and local debates are needed to evolve an appropriate and acceptable response to this new challenge.