Kerre Woodham: HIV dilemma hits home

You may not agree with the Government's decision to allow Zimbabwean immigrants who are HIV positive to become permanent residents, but really - what on earth is the alternative?

Thirteen hundred Zimbabweans were welcomed into this country, after the Government drafted a policy which granted the Zimbabweans special status. Under this policy, Zimbabweans who'd entered New Zealand as visitors were allowed to stay when the situation in their homeland deteriorated to the extent it would have been untenable for them to return.

They weren't refugees and they weren't technically immigrants either. Hence the special policy in response to public demands that something be done for these people. As they were visitors, they didn't have to undergo health screening before their arrival. Now, the Government wants them to come forward for full health checks and, in an attempt to allay fears that they'll be booted out of the country if they're found to be HIV positive, it has assured them their residency applications won't be affected provided they fulfil all the other criteria. They've also promised them fully funded treatment if they're found to have HIV, TB and/or syphilis.

Predictably, there's been an outcry from New Zealanders, particularly from people who have friends or family in dire need of healthcare.

A fax I received from a 56-year-old woman was typical. She had raised three children, all of whom were working, none of whom had been in trouble; she herself had worked since she was 19. She'd coached netball and soccer, belonged to service organisations, was happily married and enjoying her life and she'd been diagnosed with breast cancer. She was a candidate for Herceptin but as Pharmac doesn't fund that, she and her husband were faced with the dilemma of deciding whether to sell their home to pay for the treatment themselves. She wanted to know how the Government could agree to fund the healthcare of individuals who'd only just arrived in this country, but deny people like her the chance of fighting cancer.

Others spoke of friends who'd been right at the top of the points scheme for surgery, only to be told in the past month that they'd been taken off the waiting list for operations, consigning them to months of pain and uncertainty.

It's a tough one all right, and however much the Government says the treatment of HIV-positive Zimbabweans has nothing to do with the waiting lists, the perception is that new arrivals are getting preferential treatment over taxpaying New Zealanders.

It can't be easy being Zimbabwean right now either. In fact, it probably hasn't been easy to be Zimbabwean for the past 10 years. Being Zimbabwean doesn't mean, ipso facto, that you are HIV positive. And being HIV positive doesn't mean that you'll spend years malingering on the invalids' benefit. Many people who are HIV positive are working and contributing taxes towards the healthcare they receive.

But that will be cold comfort to the thousands of people waiting for operations. One person I spoke to said that we should not think of these special residents as Zimbabweans, but as human beings in dire need of help.

Whatever our gripes about rates and the weather and roading infrastructure, we are still a very lucky country. And there are still some idealists left in the world who believe we have an obligation to assist those who drew the geographical short straw.

But since the 80s, there's been a shift from community responsibility to individual responsibility. We look after ourselves and our own, and that's where our duty ends.

It's hardly surprising people feel their responsibilities end at the border. That's the world we're living in now.

However, the Zimbabweans are here now and many have been here for a number of years. It would be cruel and inhumane to send them back to where they came from.