Mulago Positive Women’s Network

About Us

The MPWN

The MPWN The Mulago Positive Women’s Network (MPWN) was started in Kampala, Uganda, in January 2004 to focus more attention on the specific needs of HIV+ women and their families there.

The MPWN’s mission is to assist these women in coping with the ramifications of their new "status". (Although on the decline in recent years, stigmatization and social isolation has often accompanied public acknowledgement of one’s HIV/AIDS status in many African countries.)

The MPWN works to empower its members by providing them with essential information regarding their health status and by helping the women obtain marketable job skills in order to better maintain their families’ stability. (See "STORES")

All the women of the MPWN receive their ARV’s (anti-retroviral medications) through the U.S. government funded program PEPFAR which was established into law in 2003 to fight the spread of HIV/AIDS in fifteen targeted countries, mainly in Africa and the Caribbean Islands. Through the actions of U.S. advocacy groups such as ONE (www.one.org), PEPFAR has helped to sustain lives and create futures for nearly 1,000,000 people in Africa in just the last several years.

The ARV’s main distribution point for MPWN is at TASO (The AIDS Support Organization - www.tasouganda.org), located within Mulago Hospital in Kampala (the largest hospital in the country). But they are also distributed in many other areas of Uganda, including Mbuya Outreach, Nsambya Hospital, Kamokya Christian Community, etc.

Why the MPWN Exists (by Agnes Nyamayarwo)

In Uganda, like in most of the developing countries, women are considerably disadvantaged economically, socially and psychologically. Coupled with physical vulnerability, this usually leads to higher rates of infection among women than men, particularly among young women and children.

The AIDS support organization (TASO) in Uganda, has done a lot in expanding access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support. As a result many of us who need treatment have accessed it, but there are many more others who need to start on the treatment because TASO  never closes its doors, new patients keep registering all the time.

Mulago Positive Women’s Network (MPWN) is a group of HIV positive women who are on treatment. Most of the members are widows whose health has improved. However they are very poor and some are uneducated. The hard truth is that, whatever their economic status or  their being uneducated,  they acquired HIV from someone they trusted, either in their marriage beds or from a long term partner. Many factors affect our taking of drugs everyday in the specified dose and at the specified time(adherence). Some women find it difficult to take drugs with clean water. In some homes, there are food shortages, women worry so much about their children’s education, some can’t even afford books and  school-uniforms for their kids attending free  primary education.

With these problems our members are facing, we tried to look for solutions, because TASO  cannot provide for everything. We make handcrafts to earn an income, but there are so many other people in Uganda making the same crafts, hence the market in our country is very small and competitive.

We also want to train our members in farming skills, and may be give them a start-off for example, in piggery, fish farming, poultry, among other things. For those without land, we want to give them skills in tailoring, knitting, food processing, while others want to go back to school. Being computer literate could also take us along way.

The group owns land where we need to put a bigger building as compared to our small craft shop where we can display our crafts and do the most of the training. We are now strong enough to work and support our families but are cut-short by the lack of funds

Special thanks go to U2 lead singer Bono, DATA, ONE campaign and the American people who are involved in this advocacy of supporting the fight against HIV/AIDS in Africa. Also, we wish to thank very sincerely the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief(PEPFAR) for the support they render to the women through TASO.

Agnes Nyamayarwo

The main facilitator of the MPWN is Agnes Nyamayarwo, a nurse from Uganda and a Board member of TASO, an organization that supports the work of the MPWN through various outreach programs. Through these programs, the MPWN is able to provide renewed hope to their members and their families for a successful future.

In many ways, Agnes Nyamayarwo's story IS the story of HIV/AIDS in Africa. Agnes, a nurse from Uganda and mother of eight children, unknowingly contracted the HIV virus from her husband. When Agnes found out that her husband had died of AIDS in 1992, she went to be tested and found out that she too was HIV+. Agnes then learned that she had unknowingly passed on the HIV/AIDS virus to her youngest son, Christopher, who would die at six years of age from AIDS.

Agnes Nyamayarwo has also become internationally known for her role as spokesperson for ONE, the campaign to make extreme poverty history. (www.one.org)

The connections between ONE and the MPWN are quite strong. When Bono, lead singer of the internationally known rock group, U2, and a longtime activist for Africa (co-founder of DATA, ONE, RED and EDUN), visited Uganda in May 2002, he met with some of the members of TASO. Bono was particularly impressed with Agnes, whose life experience with HIV/AIDS and whose quiet heroism in fighting it impressed him so much that he ultimately invited Agnes to join him and others on the "Heart of America" tour in December 2002 which launched DATA, the first African advocacy organization which Bono helped to found.

Agnes continues her work to this day with the MPWN and TASO and continues to advocate for a better future for Africa through ONE.

TASO ( The AIDS Support Organization of Uganda)

The AIDS Support Organization (TASO) was founded in 1987 by Noerine Kaleeba and fifteen other colleagues some of whom have now passed away due to AIDS.The founding of TASO was based on people that were unified by common experiences faced when encountering HIV/AIDS at a time of high stigma, ignorance and discrimination. The founders met informally in each other’s homes or offices to provide mutual psychological and social support. Cohesion among these was strengthened by the fact that they were either directly infected with HIV or implicitly affected because their very close familial associates were infected. One distinguished feature about the founder members was that they voluntarily used their time and other resources to visit AIDS patients, carrying them to the hospital and some times providing basic material and counseling support.

Today TASO is the largest indigenous NGO providing HIV/AIDS services in Uganda and Africa, having supported over 200,000 directly since its inception.The organisation has 11 service centers spread in Uganda, with now 15 "mini-TASOs" in other parts of the country that are outside TASO's catchment area of 75Km from the nearest service center. A mini TASO is a public Health unit that provides TASO-like services. TASO has given 18,000 clients ARVs including 600 children since we rolled out Antiretroviral Therapy in June 2004.