Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - August 3, 2008
Claire Keeton

Pholokgolo Ramothwala and his partner dreamed of having a child. But Ramothwala has HIV and she does not, and he didn't want to risk infecting her.

Now the couple have an exuberant little girl who turns four next week.

They decided to try "sperm washing", a process that separates the sperm from the seminal fluid (where most HIV is found) and they fertilised the egg in vitro.

Ramothwala, who has been HIV positive for 10 years, said: "This process worked for us. My wife and my child are HIV free."

He eats fruit and yoghurt for breakfast, looks after his body and does not yet need antiretroviral treatment.

"My doctor said it is possible I'm a "slow progressor" but I've asked myself: 'Is that the only reason why my CD4 count is still more than 500?'"

Aids drugs are given to patients whose CD4 count drops below 200.

Ramothwala thinks that the choices he has made, particularly living openly with HIV, have reduced his stress.

He told his wife-to-be on one of their first dates about his status.

"I told her two days after I met her. She needed to know before anything could happen. It was helpful as I did not have to deal with the stress later.

"It was better than I expected. She took a few days and came back and asked about it."

The first person he told about his HIV status never spoke about it again, however she remained his friend.

"It took me about eight months to tell the first person and it just came out. We were having a braai and it was not planned.

But after that I became really depressed," says Ramothwala, then a journalism student at Stellenbosch University. "The main reason I went for a test was because I was curious not because I was sick."

Ramothwala is currently head of partnerships at loveLife. He has lost many friends to Aids because they refused to test early for HIV and in those days Aids drugs were not affordable.

"I worked in Gauteng, Mpumalanga and Limpopo. People were getting sick and desperate. They would take any remedy to try to feel better. I would meet people and later they would be dying in front of you."

But he also met prominent Treatment Action Campaign activists like Zackie Achmat and Mark Heywood, who inspired him to stay strong.

Besides having a positive attitude to living with HIV, Ramothwala says he tries to go to the gym, and does not drink excessively or stay up all night with his friends.

"Knowing my status also helps me with my own planning, such as financial planning."

Ramothwala urges people with HIV to link up and talk about their needs.

"You can talk about having a child while you have HIV or about going on to second-line treatment.

"I encourage peer-to-peer contact. It is easier to speak to someone who is HIV positive than someone who is not."

Ramothwala goes to workplaces during HIV testing to answer questions people may have.

"I can say: 'Look at me, I've been like this for 10 years. I've only been to hospital once for pneumonia for two days and it was a small infection.'"

He's also passionate about the need to find the estimated five million people who are HIV positive, most of whom do not know their status.

"Where are these five million? We need to find them," he says, expressing support for the Right to Know HIV testing competition, which was launched a month ago by Discovery Health and the Sunday Times.

The competition is offering R100000 prize money every month for 12 months.

"I support any programme that encourages HIV testing and making people aware of their status," Ramothwala says. "When people know their status it reduces the chance of them infecting other people.

"We must give people with HIV the responsibility to reduce new infections. What we are not doing is bringing in those infected."

Ramothwala has ambitious plans to promote HIV testing and care among soccer clubs and traditional healers.

He also plans to focus on shebeens, where he sees a clear link between alcohol use and HIV.

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• HIV affects all of us. And the more we talk about it, the better we understand it. If you are living with HIV or caring for someone with it, please share your story with us. And send photos if you feel comfortable with that. E-mail your story to: everyoneknows@sundaytimes.co.za or fax it to 011-280-5151.

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