A few months ago I had the chance to work on a project for an international NGO that supports the free treatment of HIV patients around Vietnam with so called ARV’s (antiretroviral drugs). This was so far the most interesting project I worked on. We spent about a week in Saigon and Hanoi to meet several people living with HIV / AIDS and portrait their life. In fact what I did was to shoot b/w pictures in order to illustrate how they got infected with the virus, while the part about their treatment with the free medication and the improvement it made on their lives was filmed in color.

Here a few shots out of the project. I hope will have the chance to work on this topic in the future again.

HIV in Vietnam – Images by Christian Berg

After working on a photo assignment portraying people living with HIV / AIDS in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi 2 weeks ago I more than ever believer that this is a topic not addressed enough and that one of the major problems with the issue is the strong stigmatization that they actually suffer. While I was covering the story in order to promote free treatment with ARV’s in clinics I also know that prevention is of similar importance. Have a look at this story on Reuters AlertNet to read how most prevention programs actually fail on of the most at risk groups – sex workers.