'Forgotten' older victims of HIV win £¾m boost from Lottery

Published on Wednesday 15 July 2009 21:56

HELPING a neglected demographic of older people with HIV is among the aims of a project launched by Scottish charities that has received more than £750,000 of Lottery funding.

Positive Scotland, which will be run by Waverley Care and Terrence Higgins Trust (THT) Scotland, will offer support to more than 500 people with HIV or hepatitis C across Scotland in the next four years.

Some of the 768,431 grant will be used for sexual health promotion for older people with HIV, a group campaigners say is largely ignored by current HIV and hepatitis education and support in Scotland.

In welcoming the award, Ailsa Spindler, the national director of THT Scotland, said people with the disease are now living longer than many thought they would.

"The Scottish Government, for understandable reasons, but perhaps reasons that need to be challenged, focus their sexual health message on young people," she said. "But actually, sexual ill-health is something that follows you through life if you are sexually active."

Ms Spindler said THT Scotland was delighted with the Lottery funding: "The grant recognises the fact that HIV has changed from being an acute and deadly illness, to a long-term, manageable condition," she said.

"What that means is they (sufferers] are being faced with the sort of challenges we all get as we go through our lives, but in many cases they weren't expecting to live long enough to face them – diseases of old age, and things like losing their parents."

Adam, 59, who lives outside Edinburgh and has HIV, said he believed older people with the disease were being overlooked.

"It is something that needs addressing, because there is an ever-growing population of people living with HIV who are now coming into their late 50s and they are not going to have any family to turn to," he said.

"What about when it gets to the stage they can't look after themselves and have to go into a nursing home?"

The Scotland-wide project was formed after both charities submitted similar applications to the Lottery. They were asked to submit joint proposals, and a more detailed business plan will now be put in place with the aim to begin work by October.

As well as targeting neglected groups, the work will see Waverley Care, which, as the lead agency, will manage the money and help people living with HIV back into work or training.

Martha Baillie, the senior manager of community projects at Waverley Care, said part of the challenge would involve educating employers.

"Although we can support people to feel more confident about going back to work, unless employers feel confident and aren't frightened about employing people living with HIV, there is a gap," she said.

"Think about somebody who has been living with HIV for maybe ten years. With support from us they think, 'OK, now I'm ready to look for a job'.

"If you fill in any application form it asks, 'What have you been doing for the last ten or fifteen years'?"

I THOUGHT 'I'M PAST THAT'

MARY, 69, a great-grand-mother from Edinburgh, was diagnosed with HIV two years ago.

"I just couldn't believe it was true – I thought, 'I'm past that'," she says.

Mary lives on her own, but is helped by her family and regular trips to the Isis women's group run by Waverley Care.

She explains: "I have very supportive children. I told them as soon as I was diagnosed.

"My son said, 'Thank God it's not cancer!'"

She manages her condition with drugs and

leads an active life. "I go swimming every day, go to pilates once a week and come to Isis once a week," she says. "It can happen to anybody. It's just another illness you have to live with.

"Don't let it get to you. There is nothing wrong with you. You haven't committed a crime, or done anything bad. It's just something that happens."