Dzambuyo who now operates a restaurant business at Zalewa said while she has benefited much from her openness with her HIV status, she regrets the moment she disclosed that she was living with HIV.

“When I was disclosing the news to my husband I was doing it in the faith of protecting our family and the interests of our daughters; however the opposite was true, “she said.

She said as a single mother she did not have much control on her daughters and as a result the children started doing casual sex work and one of the daughters Susan lives with HIV.

Dzambuyo’s experience is unique to many Malawian women who brave the reality of disclosing their sero-status to their husbands.

Rhoda Banda of Chauya village in the central Malawian district of Ntcheu said that many women that disclose their HIV status to their husband in the end face the blunt of losing their families.

Interesting as the development is these men that stigmatize their HIV positive wives later end up marrying younger girls or might be engaged into casual sex with many teen age girls there by returning the AIDS circle in society.

“It was very funny to hear my husband telling me that we are separating when I told him that I had tested positive to HIV and interesting as the development was, I later learnt that he had married a teenage girl, “she said.

The husband according to Rhoda has now changed three wives and he might continue returning the AIDS circle, however Rhoda believes that he is being forced into the trend because of the high rate of stigma that revolves around the epidemic.

The National HIV and AIDS Policy recently launched in Malawi underlines stigma and discrimination as one of the stumbling blocks in the response to the epidemic.

While the government of Malawi has successfully put over 230,000 people on Anti Retroviral Therapy, HIV and AIDS based stigma and discrimination has been singled out as one of the major blocks to the scale up of HIV services.

Interestingly however those people that stigmatize others are those that are practicing risky sexual lives.

As in the Dzambuyo experience, many married men who usually have sex with many sex-workers including casual sex with teen age girls usually chose to divorce their wives when HIV strikes in the family.

The Malawi Health Equity Network believes the problem of HIV based stigma and discrimination can well be addressed if people are adequately sensitized on their rights their health rights.

Lloyd Mtalimanja program manager at the Malawi Health Equity Network said in Neno recently that there was need to have a theory of change to address the problem of stigma and discrimination in the country.

He said the Network would soon embark on the equity in access to treatment and accountability project which will among other things promote the understanding of people that are living with HIV on their rights.

He said a recent study by the Net work indicated that while there was availability of HIV treatment in Malawi many people were shunning to access it because of the stigma that is attached o the epidemic.

Samson Njolomole External Relations Manager at Partners in Health an international health organization working in Neno said that the organization has been addressing the problem of sigma by organizing patient parties which have changed peoples mindset on HIV positive living.

He said the program had some impact but was quick to point that stigma continued to be high in Malawi.

Malawi has over 1 million people living with HIV and of these 230,000 are on Anti Retroviral Treatment. Mostly affected are women and children who face the blunt of stigma.