Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa, 2009. In this rural area HIV raged to its full extent, infection numbers are amongst the highest worldwide. This is part of a documentary on the life in a community where traditional family care has fallen apart.

Early afternoon Thandiwe’s children are at home. Her husband died of AIDS in 2006, she herself is now in the final stage of her disease. A stroke made her even less mobile and working for money is not possible anymore. Sending her children to school is too expensive. When pregnant with her last child, she neglected to go to the maternity hospital so Senamile (8) was infected as well.  The government does not provide ARV therapy for children that young and Senamile will most probably never turn ten. Her uncle keeps an eye on her and does the basic household chores.

Over the past 20 years, HIV/AIDS has spread wildly. In the rural area Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa, it made an already weak society, with almost no industry and huge unemployment numbers, even weaker. A major part of the active population died, leaving thousands of orphans behind. Traditional care from their extended family has nearly disappeared; they are the head of the family, taking care of who is left.

27th of Februari 2009, Engozini, Kwa-Zulu Natal, South Africa. 5 am in the morning, the sun is rising, Ntombi is waking up. She lights up the fire, prepares breakfast for her terminally ill mother. Slowly her two brothers are waking up, too. Their father died of AIDS two years ago.
The children serve their mother’s ARV treatment, seven pills a day, at exact times and with compulsory meals. The oldest brother gets to eat first and leaves the earliest. He walks an hour to school. Ntombi and her younger brother make homework, prepare for school and leave to school on an empty stomach.