The HIV-positive caregivers working to end AIDS in Africa Dotty Nyambok is an HIV Counselor at the Embakasi Health Centre in Nairobi, Kenya. She is halfway through her list of patients when two girls walk into her tent. Helima, 18, is here because she suspects she’s contracted HIV from her boyfriend, and her friend Winny has come to support her. Dotty begins a familiar ritual: She unwraps a sterilized needle, pricks Helima’s finger and drops blood onto a test strip. Then she sets the timer. 15:00, 14:59, 14:58… While they wait, Dotty asks Helima what she thinks will happen if she tests positive. With grim confidence, she answers, she will die. That’s when Dotty shares something of herself. It’s information she reveals when she senses someone is in desperate need of kindness and hope. “I’m HIV-positive,” Dotty says. “So when you have HIV you will continue living, because you will take your medication.” The girls exchange surprised, shy smiles in the tent at Embakasi, a facility w...