28 : Stories of AIDS in Africa

28 million infected with HIV in Africa. How can we possibly understand such a calamity? Only by understanding what it has done to individuals.

Like 'serial orphan' Tigis Haile Michael, solely responsible since the age of ten for herself and her younger brother: 'I shouldn't be worried about this. It should be for others to worry.'

Zackie Achmat, battling the South African government for wider access to life-saving drugs: 'It's like your parents withholding medicine from you when you're a kid.'

Beauty queen Cynthia Leshomo, Miss HIV Stigma-Free Botswana: 'I thought, "I won't get it because I am young and beautiful and not of the class to be infected."'

Praise for 28:

'Magnificent, inspiring, informative. Nolen opens the essential door to the brave, suffering, human reality of the African AIDS crisis.'

John le Carré

'Read. Weep. Rage. And above all else?like those people described in this brilliant book?find the courage to do'.

Dr James Orbinski, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of Médecins Sans Frontiéres

'The stories will tear you apart before putting you back together, fully armed and ready to go to war on a virus more dangerous than any WMD.'

Bono

'Probably the best book ever written about AIDS...I wept when I finished.'

Stephen Lewis, author of Race Against Time and former UN Special Envoy HIV/AIDS in Africa