Mira (left) and her eldest brother at their mother’s grave at Kampung Kadut, Segamat.
SEGAMAT: Death lurks in many homes in Kampung Kadut here with several families having at least one member who is HIV positive.
Eight people, aged between 24 and 40, have died in the last 18 months.
Some signed their death warrants by sharing needles when taking drugs.
Sarah, 74, knows the pain of losing the young to HIV.
A heart patient, who lost her son and daughter-in-law to HIV, she now looks after the couple’s 6-year-old daughter, Mira, who also has been confirmed as being HIV positive.
Her son, Azizul, did not know he was HIV positive when he married Shila, then only 16, in Langkawi in 2000. Shila had accepted the fact that her husband was a drug addict.
It was when she was pregnant with their third child that the couple found out they were both HIV positive.
Sarah said Azizul and Shila lived in Langkawi and had a fourth child who, thankfully, is free of the disease.
“She had a Caesarean section done on her to reduce the risk of infecting the baby with the HIV virus but the operation made her weak and she never fully recovered from it,” said Sarah.
The couple returned to live with Sarah until their death.
Shila died of pneumonia on Aug 27, 2006 at the age of 24 while Azizul, 40, died in January last year.
“The children’s health is monitored by the Health Department and last month, alhamdullillah, they confirmed that the youngest baby was not infected.”
Sarah, who is also taking care of another healthy grandchild, is leaving Mira’s fate to God.
“She knows she has a disease, but that does not mean she cannot lead a normal life.
“She plays with other children like any normal child.”
Sarah said the drug problem began in the 1980s when a group of youths became addicts.
“I saw them congregating, sometimes as early as 6am, at the pondok durian to wait for the pusher to arrive.”
There were many occasions, Sarah said, when she shooed them off from her orchard and called the police, but her efforts were futile as they would get their fix elsewhere.
Another villager, Norma, 59, buried her HIV positive son Nordin after he fainted not 20m from her front door.
“I saw him walking out of the house. Just as he crossed the road, he collapsed.
“It was heartbreaking to see your own son die right before your eyes.
“We tried our best to distract him but the peer pressure was too strong.
“So he eventually became one of them,” said the single mother.
Nordin was not her only loss. Last year, two of her half- brothers, both HIV positive, died at her house.
Norma said, unlike a normal death, the bodies of those infected with HIV would be handled by the Health Department.
“We could only watch as the body is laid to rest. It is terribly sad because it is not the normal way to pay the last respects to your loved ones,” she said.
A neighbour, who did not want to be named, has buried her three HIV positive sons since 2006.
“No words can convey the desperation of a mother seeing her sons wasted by drugs and dying of an incurable disease,” she said.
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