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Children with HIV live in fear of discovery

Updated: 2013-08-21 01:03

By Shan Juan ( China Daily)

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Mental Support

A summer camp for HIV-positive children aged 10 to 15 last week in Kunming, Yunnan province, focused on their mental health.

The camp, held by the Chinese Association of Sexually Transmitted Disease and AIDS Prevention and Control and the pharmaceutical company AbbVie, is the first of its kind to focus mainly on the health of such children, said Shen Jie, deputy director of the association.

"Unlike the commonly seen sightseeing type, the camp aims to inform the children in a proper way of the disease they suffer from, help them correctly identify their status and better handle negative feelings," she said.

Xiao Jie, an eleven-year-old from the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, was never told about her condition, though she's been on medication for four years.

Her teacher, surnamed Li, said the girl did in fact know a little bit about her condition but never recognized that in public.

"It's typical of the sense of denial that they tend to develop entering their teens," she said.

According to Li, it requires great expertise in mental health to properly inform children of their condition. "That should usually happen after they reach 10, but China has no guidelines for that," she noted.

Jiajia, 10, from Guangxi, said she felt relaxed at the camp because "we all have HIV, so I don't have to hide anything".

Outside the camp, however, "I need to stay on high alert, mainly to hide my disease," she said, adding that she always takes the medicine in secret.

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