Lights out for clinics

SERVICES: US AID FUNDING FREEZE PUTS HIV/AIDS TREATMENTS ON HOLD

- Linda Givetash

The gates of a Johannesburg LGBTQ clinic called OUT have been closed for more than a week and HIV prevention and treatment services suspended for its 6,000 clients.

The lights are also off at the University of the Witwatersrand's HIV project, a leader in the provision of services to sex workers in South Africa, a country with one of the largest HIV-positive populations in the world.

They are among the several South African HIV/AIDS health care providers that have been left confused, angry and scrambling for survival since US President Donald Trump issued a 90-day freeze last week on foreign aid.

"Short-term, I hope that some money can flow so that medium and long term, we can make other plans," said Dawie Nel, the director of OUT, whose Engage Men's Health clinic in Johannesburg has a note fixed to the gate announcing it is "temporarily closed".