Community Cures

Zinhle Thabethe is an HIV activist in South Africa and a member of the Sinikithemba Choir. She was diagnosed HIV-positive in 2002, and nearly died. But a stranger appeared at her home and carried Zinhle on her back to a newly opened HIV clinic near Zinhle’s home in Durban, South Africa. Although over 800,000 infected persons in the community needed treatment, Zinhle was one of 90 people selected to receive the necessary medication.

She struggled with anger and guilt: “I used to think, why me? Why did I have to be infected with this HIV? Now I think, why do I get to live while others next to me are dying without these drugs?” It was this thinking that drove Zinhle to speak out for other HIV victims. Her goal is to raise money so that one more neighbor in South Africa can get the medication he or she desperately needs, so one more neighbor will live.