Living at the peak of one’s adult life calls for a number of life plan adjustments, changes and commitments for the future and a good health plan is one of them! Among other things, an HIV test is almost compulsory. Before I queued to taking the test, I remembered the homophobic Pastor Ssempa emphasizing that HIV is spread most among homosexuals; yes his sentiment holds some grain of truth and this gave me more reason to stick to my commitment.
As a lesbian, my mind first run to how many women I had undressed, whose vaginas I had leaked causing them to sing melodies of excitement and how many times I had been less careful not to contract HIV. Have I been keen enough not to have the live and bare engagement that predisposes me to HIV infection?
I remembered the series of one night stands I seldom enjoyed, the short scheduled kind of relationships I entangled myself into. I wondered if my multiple sex partners were as ‘playerful’ as I am. The hit and runs, all sorts of sex encounters that made me susceptible to contracting the virus, the fun and sweetness I derived from rubbing and thrusting my labia unto my partners’ clitoris invoked carelessness; my pleasure could be the conduit to my acquiring the dreaded virus!
My memories run fresh to the number of women (married unhappily to men) who used me as their sexual satisfaction tool. I foolishly enjoyed the warmth of their thighs forgetting their husbands too did the same with other young girls. The chain of our immorality stemmed from our unfaithfulness and lack of respect for our lives. Little did I know that I was bridging the spread of HIV between the lesbians and the married heterosexual couples!
I held my breath as I got pricked; considering the discrimination we still harbor in the health sector, where gay men, transgenders and lesbians don’t access health care services with ease especially those in regard to their ways of conjugation.
From a practical point of view; there is a gap which must be filled- incorporating the LGBTI community and the sex workers into the health care system is a back log that still hinders the development that works to viewing an HIV free generation in place.
These groups of people are a conduit to the spread of HIV to the major sexual groups. For as long as we must achieve the dream, we must claim responsibility of our sins and actions! We must talk about homosexuality however remote it sounds; yes it exists among us and it affects us in more ways than we realize or care to admit.
Efforts to cut down the new infections will keep futile if the law makers don’t incorporate the sex workers and LGBTI persons into the health care systems. Free and non discriminative health services must be uniformly distributed to persons for the world to achieve the dream of a HIV free generation.
We can hide from the truth but not forever; homosexuality is a reality and we must come to terms with it! Devising means to include the sex workers and the LGBTI persons into the health care systems must be made a priority.
As published in Bombastic Magazine
