STIGMA & DISCRIMINATION

In a recent meeting, held in Capital Hospital, Bhubaneswar on 27 December, on stigma and discrimination, a PLHIV member brought up the issue that in most of the prescriptions provided in the column of diseases the Medical Officer of that hospital write AIDS, this has resulted in discrimination as the nurses and the pharmacists mistreat them, the Medical Officer gave an explanation that he had certain moral responsibility towards other Doctors as the patient would never reveal his HIV status. The Participants straight away protested and argued with the Doctor, what about the rights of the patient, does the patient not have any rights.
Though the Doctor did not have any reply to that he persisted with his answer about how important it was to protect the doctors from syringe pricks. Rather the Medical Officer justified and stated that discrimination happens in every field and every issues and tried to trivialize this particular serious issue of concern of people being discriminated on the basis of their HIV status.
What can be done to change the attitude of Doctors; are we doing enough to change their attitude; are our training programmes adequate ; are we taught enough by our parents, teachers and elders about respecting life and human beings in general; I think these are questions that one should be constantly asking own self as well friends, families, loved ones enough.