THE LATEST face of Chile's HIV crisis is a woman with no face. Hidden behind dark glasses, her head swathed in a shawl to hide her identity, the 25-year-old woman known as "Lorena" or "LCC" filed a lawsuit in the city of San Antonio, Chile, last week, flanked by a congressman and surrounded by reporters.
Her accusation: that public health officials did not inform her she had contracted HIV, which resulted in the death of her seven-month-old daughter, who was also infected.
"The only thing I ask for is justice. They can't bring my daughter back to me with money," she told a reporter. "What enrages me is that these people are walking around with impunity for life, knowing that they did something horrible."
Lorena is among a ballooning number of people in Chile who were not told they had tested positive for HIV and therefore were denied potentially life-saving treatment. Officials said this month that the public health system had failed to notify 512 people of their status and that private health centres had not contacted more than 1,000 others.
The scandal, which began with the news that a hospital in northern Chile had not told patients they were HIV positive, led to the resignation of health minister Maria Soledad Barria last month, to plans to reform the notification system and a recent warning that the government could declare a "health emergency" if the hundreds of people who still do not know they have the virus are not found and told quickly.
The situation has also prompted a vigorous debate about public health, sexuality and the politics of HIV.
"Who is responsible for this situation?" Teresa Valdes, a sociologist and board member of a women's rights organisation, wrote in an opinion column posted on the El Mostradorwebsite.
"Is it the official of the laboratory that delivered the result, the health centre where the test took place . . . or a society that denies sexual diversity, that has discriminated for years against homosexuals and that drapes a cloak of silence over the sexuality of its members?"
Some blame the infected. Marcela Contreras, a prominent haematologist, said the scandal was "out of proportion" and could damage a quality blood service system in Chile.
"There is a responsibility of the patients that went to take the HIV test because many of them did not give their correct addresses or telephone numbers," she said
A joint statement issued by two groups that deal with HIV, Vivo Positivo and Asosida, called the situation the "worst health crisis the country has faced in recent years" and "a flagrant violation of human rights and the right to life".
An editorial in La Nacionnewspaper said the stigma and secrecy surrounding HIV in Chile - a socially conservative and predominantly Roman Catholic country - contributed to the current crisis.
"Sexual promiscuity is a reality that must be acknowledged, regardless of philosophical or religious views. Thus, prevention campaigns must be more explicit . . . when it comes to the risks and alternatives for protecting yourself against AIDS," the editorial said. - ( Los Angeles Times-Washington Postservice)