I AM NOT A WOLF: HIV AND THE ILLS OF SOCIAL STIGMA

I am not a wolf. News about corruption allegations has recently dominated both mainstream Kenyan media outlets and social media platforms. Any other story hardly has a chance to standout. And yet I can't stop thinking about an investigative feature of the little boy with HIV, who has been made to feel as if he is a wolf. That's how low social stigma can descend to.

In a masterfully pieced expose, Stigma Academy, the despicable practice of discriminating against people living with HIV, is brought to the fore.

The administration of a school shamelessly refuses to enrol a 12-year-old boy, after learning he has HIV. The pretext is that there's no admission vacancy, but the institution readily offers a chance to another decoy child, fronted by the news crew.

The audience is let in on the intention to prove there is discrimination, so it's clear everything is staged.

But then the sequence begins to be more gripping, when the boy's mother expresses the pain of seeing her son being denied the chance to get a decent education, on the basis of his HIV status.

And the depressing level of human hatred sinks several notches, when the young boy concretises his battle with social stigma.

"I am not a wolf." 

These words should forever haunt the perpetrators of stigma. And may they also provoke concerned authorities to do more in their effort to eradicate all forms of discrimination against people living with HIV.

After all, the boy is indeed not a wolf. He's just as human as you and I.

The real wolf is the source of the stigma.