Surya Prakash Kandel

Narayangadh, February 18:

Quacks are allegedly swindling money from AIDS patients, promising to cure them with Ayurvedic and homeopathic treatment. While any effective drug against AIDS is yet to be developed, these ‘doctors’ are assuring AIDS patients that a cure is possible and cheating them of their money, AIDS-hit Durga Bhattarai alleged.

The quackery is flourishing since reliable and established medical treatment or anti-retroviral therapy is still not easily available to AIDS patients in Nepal, chairperson of the Chitwan active group Dikshya Rimal, said. Nawalparasi-native Durga and her 9-year-old son are both infected. She came to Bharatpur two years, hoping to get treated. When she got no relief after treatment for months by astrologer Kamal Raj Bhandari of Bharatpur municipality-7, Durga realised she had been cheated.

Raju Pokharel and Sujata, a couple from Nawalparasi’s Deurali, who contracted AIDS eight years ago, also approached Bhandari for treatment in August, 2002. The Pokharel couple, who said they spent nearly Rs 30,000 on the treatment, almost died. The 70-year-old astrologer Bhandari, on the other hand, claims he has inherited the AIDS-treatment skill from his elders, who have treated patients for generations. He claimed, “About 400 AIDS patients have visited me for treatment, and most of them have been cured.”

Bhandari, however, declined to give any evidence to back up his claim. When enquired about the names of those being treated, he says, “Being AIDS-hit, they are reluctant to publicise their identity. But, I can disclose names of those 15 persons now living in a foreign country, who are already fully cured.” Bhandari claimed AIDS-positive could turn into AIDS-negative if patients follow his prescription strictly for 18 months. Bhandari has been giving powders and tablets made from different herbs as remedial drugs to AIDS-positive patients at the rate of Rs 1,600 a month. Ram Hari Neupane, regional coordinator of the general welfare academy in Narayangadh, scoffed at Bhandari’s claims. He said, “The claim that AIDS patients are cured is nothing more than propaganda. We are trying to alert the patients to stay away from such places.”

Dr Krishna Shah, a medical officer of the AMDA, Nepal, another NGO, which is running the programme related to HIV and STD, says, “Taking drugs which are not scientifically proved is dangerous. The HIV-infected who need to take balanced and nutritious food, cannot get required calories from bread and Dhindo, as prescribed by Bhandari and his ilk.” The government should make available anti-retroviral therapy treatment service easily available in all the districts to check the cheating in the name of AIDS treatment, said Dipen Pokharel, president of the Navakiran Plus Chitwan, an organization of the AIDS infected.