Hopes for cure

You see them pasted on the sides of the local trains in Mumbai. Dirty frayed pieces of paper stuck to dirty walls. But on them are words of hope.

Drinking addiction? Take these pills. Unlucky with life, love, marriage, property? Call Baba at this number - within 24 hours your problem solved. Guaranteed. Tired after day? Need stamina for her? Hero-XS tablets - with gold powder.

Add to this the picture above. HAKH foundation (Hootone AIDS Kidney Heart) is one of the many outfits that lives off the hopes people have for a miracle cure. They claim their unnani meds do it. They use PCR tests to 'prove' it and their website says that they have FDA testing stating their medications are safe.

The sheer audacity of such charlatans is galling. But then again our 'traditional medical systems' can make almost any claim without having to prove it. And to top it off they sprinkle enough words that come from what they call 'allopathic medicine' to make their point - PCR tests, CD4 counts, Immune Reconstitution etc. All totally alien to their body of healing knowledge that they claim to come from - but used to flog their drugs.

Sadly these companies seem to be laughing all the way to the bank.

One day they will stand before the judgement throne. And give account for all the thousands of rupees that they fleeced from the poor (and not-so-poor) who were desperate for some cure for HIV. Who hoped against hope that the HAKH meds (and you can name others like the notorious 'Fair Pharma' etc) will take them out of their HIV status and into total healing.

Meanwhile the families see their already precarious funds sucked off by what can only be called vultures.

But with one distinct difference.

Real vultures gather around the dead body. These false merchants of hope fly far away.