Edwin Cameron
Witness to AIDS
With contributions by Nathan Geffen
TAFELBERG
‘For these survivors, remembering is a duty. They do not want to forget, and above all they do not want the world to forget, because they understand that their experiences were not meaningless . . .’
PRIMO LEVI
For the Richters –
Jeanie, Wim, Marlise and Graham
Foreword
Edwin Cameron is an important South African who has made lasting contributions in many fields, not least the law. I am delighted that he is now adding to his titles that of ‘author’, and I have no doubt that this book will contribute to the greater good in the same way that he has done in other areas of life.
It is as a campaigner in the HIV/AIDS pandemic that Edwin has been most readily recognisable as a public figure in recent years and, as someone living with AIDS himself, his witness and activism have shown the hallmarks of great bravery and principle that I have long associated with his name.
Several years ago, I sent a message in support of Edwin, who was to deliver the Diana, Princess of Wales Lecture on AIDS. I said it was a particular privilege to pay tribute to him as one of South Africa’s new heroes: as a human rights lawyer and now Justice in our country, his record is a testimony to his convictions and integrity. I added that as an AIDS activist he had demonstrated a level of courage and humanity that inspired many people into action. I reiterate that message now, and hope that the publication of his story will mean that still more people come to understand that this pandemic demands action in the same way that the struggle against apartheid demanded action.
I hope that every person who reads this book will feel encouraged to make a contribution to the campaign to provide the means and resources to end the pandemic. AIDS and the stigma attached to it remains one of the greatest challenges for all of us wherever we live, and it is voices like Edwin’s that will remind us, and keep on reminding us, that no one should sleep easily until the disease is defeated.
Edwin Cameron was courageous in publicly declaring his status. He is an example to all that one can live with that status and continue to make a meaningful contribution to achieving a better life for all. This book will, I am certain, be a further major contribution by this courageous South African towards that quest for a better life for all.
NR MANDELA
February 2005
1. Second chances
I knew that I had AIDS when I could no longer climb the stairs from the judges’ common room in the High Court to my chambers two floors above. For nearly three years, every morning after tea, I made a point of walking. Two flights, four landings, forty stairs. But on that day in late October 1997 I couldn’t. Each step seemed an insuperable effort. My energy seemed to have drained from my legs. I was perspiring grey exhaustion. My lungs felt waterlogged. My mouth rough and dry. No pain. Just overwhelming weariness.
And fear.
After twenty steps I paused on the midway landing to lean my forehead against the wall. The stairwell was quiet. I could hear myself panting. I grimaced. The thought – that thought – could no longer be postponed. I would have to see my doctor. This afternoon.
But already I knew what he would say. It was what somehow I had been waiting for – fearing, dreading, denying, as it encircled me, closing in, for twelve years. My mouth and lungs told me what I didn’t want to know, didn’t need to be told. I had AIDS.
Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. An accumulation of rare afflictions of the human body. Uncommon lung infections. Unusual cancers. Disabling funguses. Running unbridled through the body – because the immune system no longer functions. Threatening debilitation and portending a lingering death.
I already knew a lot about AIDS. That it is caused by HIV – a rare kind of virus that destroys a type of white blood cell in the human body, the helper T or CD4+ T cells. These are vital to the body’s defences against disease. HIV targets them. Because it cannot replicate on its own, the virus enters the helper T cells – the very cells that produce the body’s defence mechanisms against disease – and cannibalises the cell mechanisms to reproduce itself. As HIV destroys more and more CD4 cells, the immune system becomes weaker, less able to ward off new infections. Each illness in turn weakens the body further and renders it less able to fight HIV – causing a terrible cycle of wasting illnesses that culminate in death.
All this I knew. In fact, I knew too much. I didn’t want to know more. Specifically I didn’t want to know that HIV had finally succeeded in getting the better of my own immune system. That I had reached the diagnostic point where I was not ‘just’ living with HIV (a last consoling defence) – but that I actually had AIDS. And that without immediate, expert intervention I faced near-certain death.
In that southern spring of 1997 there was much in my life that was good, that I wanted to build on. Apart from deeply supportive family relationships (and a new love affair, later to prove misguided), my work as a High Court judge was challenging and interesting. The Johannesburg High Court is South Africa’s busiest superior court. As a former human rights lawyer – one whose practice as an advocate did not focus on commercial cases – I wanted to meet the challenge of getting on top of the intricate contractual and company law problems and insolvencies the court roll presented each day. Most of all I was determined to keep up. Every judge in Johannesburg works under remorseless pressure. I didn’t want to let anyone down. But even more I didn’t want to admit to myself – couldn’t afford to admit to myself, still less to colleagues – that I was desperately ill.
So as increasing tiredness took hold of me, as my body stopped digesting food and I lost appetite and weight, as I felt more and more shortness of breath, my response was to stretch my working hours, to cut out alcohol and late evenings to conserve energy, to bury myself in books and files so that I could stay abreast. To stop work would be to admit defeat. And admitting defeat meant death.
That week the judge-president (the senior judge in the division, who allocates the work) nominated me to a two-judge panel whose purpose was to decide appeals from the magistrates’ decisions. Our case-load involved appeals against convictions and sentences in criminal cases (drugs, rapes, assault, robbery, murder) as well as civil appeals (car crashes, contractual clashes, disputes between landlords and tenants). The long and demanding case lists required advance preparation over weekends and in the evenings. The senior colleague sitting with me was a wine connoisseur, a refined and courteous man who treated both agreement and disagreement with cordiality.
The previous day one of our cases had already brought disagreement. For some reason this collegial difference triggered an especial attentiveness in me. A young man had submitted a false insurance claim for a stolen car and its contents. This made him guilty of the criminal offence of fraud. When he was arrested, the insurance company was busy processing his claim for his Opel Kadett. A second claim for the belongings he claimed he had left inside it – compact disc player, speaker and discs, golf clubs, gym kit and sunglasses – had already been paid out to him in insurance benefits. His conduct undoubtedly constituted a serious misdemeanour.
A prisons’ social worker recommended a soft option – instead of jail the young man should be house-arrested and made to undergo counselling and perform community service. In favour of this was his clean record.
