The stigma that she was somehow responsible, either through sexual promiscuity or a drug addiction, remains. In her case she had been raped.

I talked with another woman with HIV, on the day it was revealed that HIV is on the increase in the North East with 1,086 people receiving treatment in 2008 compared with 1,006 people in 2007.

Far from hiding away, Winnie Sseruma believes in taking centre stage as an ambassador for confronting all those who stigmatise those with Aids.

And you can hear her say so this Monday night at 7pm when she speaks at a special service in Sunderland Minster on the eve of World AIDS day.

It was not important, said Winnie, how she came to be infected, only to diminish the stigma. That is the big issue,

It's something of a coup to have her here. As HIV mainstreaming co-ordinator for Christian Aid, Winnie is much in demand – especially on this day.

It was a chance meeting a few months ago with Canon Stephen Taylor, rector of Bishopwearmouth – they both ended up sitting next to one another at a wedding – that Winnie, 48, who has lived with HIV for 21 years, accepted his invitation to speak.

A forthright woman, she is challenging Christians and congregations at home and abroad to openly talk about the issues that impact on HIV and honestly face up to whether they would welcome or shun someone – as has happened in certain churches in this country – because they have Aids.

Some religious leaders have called it a sin.

"I was shattered," says Winnie, a practising Roman Catholic. "Many seek solace in their faith and to be ostracised like that was no good. When I started working for Christian Aid I realised I could start to talk to congregations and church leaders and convince them that we are not sinners, just citizens of the world like them, and we need love and compassion. HIV can happen to anyone."

And that's another message she has:"Young people may think they can get everything else but HIV."

Winnie was shattered when she was dealt the bombshell diagnosis out of the blue that she was HIV positive. It was only discovered in a routine medical check when she applied for a job in north America.

She thought it was a death sentence. Instead she says: "My life took a new direction from that point. It wasn't necessarily about finding that your dreams haven't been realised. Actually my life pleasantly
surprises me every day."

She steadfastly refuses other people devaluing her just because she has HIV and this has become her cause celebre for everyone with HIV/Aids.

She said: "It isn't just how people perceive you. It's you as a person living with it, how you perceive yourself, how you handle it."

With 80,000 people living with HIV in the UK, one quarter don't even know that they are HIV positive.

The most important thing people need to know is how to protect themselves from getting infected.


There are four ways of infection – through blood contact, unprotected sex with an HIV positive person; being born to a mother with HIV; through breastfeeding from a mother who is HIV positive.

The World Health Organization and the Joint UN Programme on HIV/Aids (UNAids) say an estimated 33.4 million people worldwide are infected with HIV. That figure is up from 33 million in 2007 because fewer are dying with HIV.

As the candelight procession snakes its way from Sunderland Uni's library to the Minster at 6.30pm on Monday night, to mark World AIDS day, I hope it lights up the whole issue.

This is no time for complacency. Winnie will be welcomed I know but how would we react to being confronted with a person with HIV?

Would we walk away or offer a listening ear?

It is all too easy to be judgmental. Just ask Winnie.