The story of Mana

As related by Terry Sebastian

... Mana, a beautiful young woman draped in an orange cloth and her very tiny baby Fatimat caught my eye. Fatimat was 2 months old and her mother was HIV positive. Mana was kicked out of her house when her husband found out her positive status. She went back to live with her parents and was forbidden to contact her husband again. (He had another wife and at least 4 more children.) She was convinced that her baby was negative for the virus. But when we tested tiny Fatimat, she was positive. Mana seemed OK, but the reality of her emotions showed up at our hotel the next day, and I could see her pain, the fear in her eyes, and I just wanted to hug her, throwing any rules out the window. I felt a deep sense of helplessness for her when she looked at me, and I still do. It is estimated that ten percent of new HIV infections in Nigeria are caused by Mothers breastfeeding their children. Later, I was shocked and disillusioned to learn that men here can acquire as many wives as they can support, and that women here are treated much differently than in the Western world. It is not uncommon for some men to have concubines and wives, raising twenty to thirty children.
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