As the sun sets over the village of Katongo in western Zambia, 38-year-old Mutukwa Nalwendo's solemn face stands out against the frivolity of the community's children playing in the dust, savouring the last light.

She explains that it's time to take her anti-retroviral therapy (ART). "I know the pills are stopping HIV from killing me, and that is good," she says. But tonight, there is no food for her family and taking them on an empty stomach can cause dizziness and sickness. "I may not be able to keep them down," she says.

Mutukwa, who has a husband and seven children, used to receive Food Aid - emergency and temporary supplies of foodstuffs. "But now it has been stopped, and we struggle to survive on the money I make from doing some small bits of farming work and from the money my husband makes from selling stools. Sometimes one or two days go by when we have no food."

Across the developing world, more than 1.2 billion people currently live below the international poverty line, earning less than US$1 per day, and most inevitably have problems obtaining adequate, nutritious food for themselves and their families. As a result, 815 million people are undernourished, consuming less than the minimum number of calories essential for sound health and growth. Many of those undernourished individuals who are also HIV positive - 25 million people in sub-Saharan Africa alone - are in serious danger of succumbing to Aids

Kate Hilpern
The Guardian

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