AIDS in Romania

Last night my friend Hetty White told me about the latest project she is working on. She is a film editor for a small agency, Tomorrow Pictures, located in Atlanta. They are currently working on a documentary about the AIDS epidemic in Romania. I didn’t know anything about this social issue and found it interesting. Seeking to increase birth rates during the communist regime of Nicolae Ceausescu in the 1980’s, women were not aloud to use contraceptives unless they had at least 5 children. This practice resulted in a large population of babies being abandoned by their parents and placed into over-crowded orphanages and hospitals. A great deal of these children were then given unscreened units of blood or immunizations with dirty syringes, infecting them with HIV/AIDS. Although the Romanian government took charge in the early 1990’s putting a stop to the dangerous practices which were spreading pediatric AIDS; today these infected children are becoming sexually active adults. This is especially discouraging when commercial sex-trafficking and homosexuality are increasingly visible practices in their culture. The Romanian government is now making an effort to teach and promote safe-sex practices and provide treatment for people who already are infected, but what is the solution? I am interested to watch the documentary when they’re done to gain more insight on how this epidemic is truly affecting Romania today.