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HOPE Cape Town was one of the first organizations in South Africa to initiate antiretroviral therapy for HIV+ children and caregivers some years ago.  Families, primarily from Germany, sponsored the treatment of a person for a year.  HOPE Cape Town employed a part-time doctor, Dr Madri Carstens, to treat, adapt medication and monitor the progress of the patients.

In the beginning HOPE Cape Town wanted to help as many children as possible.  However HOPE Cape Town learnt that there had to be selection criteria for inclusion on the programme as many children were too weak to benefit from the medication.  There were very difficult decisions to make for the people concerned with this part of the program. 

From the beginning there was the careful scientific documentation of all the patients on the merits and also side effects of the treatment.  The data was given to the Children’s Infectious Diseases Clinical Research Unit (KID-CRU) based at Tygerberg Unit. The results from KID-CRU research were instrumental in the development of the government antiretroviral treatment programme. 

The last 19 patients were transfered into care of the provincial authorities in December 2007. The HOPE Cape Town doctor contiunes to support the role out in seeing little patients who are developing complications. The Community Health Workers are assisting the government programme as compliance officers ensuring the effective treatment of HIV+ people. As HOPE Cape Town understands itself as an organization filling the gaps in governmental approaches, the question of compliance and adherence will be a focal point in the next years to come; leaving the hand out of medication with the provincial administration, which is meanwhile with the help of foreign donors perfectly capable of doing so.

treatment - HOPE for the future