Society
Let’s talk about sex in Moldova
FORNICATION HAS OVERTAKEN DRUG USE AS THE MAIN ROUTE OF TRANSMISSION FOR NEW CASES OF HIV IN MOLDOVA – THE COUNTRY NEEDS A DEEP AND MEANINGFUL CONVERSATION ABOUT SEX
After losing his job as a barman in Moldova’s capital of Chisinau, 26 year-old Ivan found some raised dark brown blemishes on his skin.
At a local clinic, the doctors diagnosed a sarcoma and took blood tests to establish the problem.
Two weeks later the results confirmed that Ivan was HIV positive.
But he was not surprised.
“I knew the kind of life I had led,” he says. “It was not good.”
Since he was 11 years old, Ivan was aware he was gay.
“I did not know about sex, but when I was at a school camp I saw two boys kissing and realized I liked it.”
He first slept with a man when he was 16.
“We met through the internet – it’s where you can get the attention of another man by writing something along the lines of ‘I like beautiful, sporty boys’.”
After dropping out of studying psychology, he worked as a barman and every night went to clubs.
Here he would pick up girls – a lot of girls – and tells me he slept with “one hundred”.
“Every day I got to know a new girl.”
How did you manage this? I ask. What was your technique – your secret? I push for the answer, intrigued at the quantity.
“Women liked me. Some were much younger than me. Some were in school.”
He did not use condoms, nor did he worry about pregnancy.
“I didn’t think about it,” he says. “Sex was the most important thing for me.”
However his female liaisons were eclipsed by the number of men he slept with – perhaps 200.
“It was an unhealthy lifestyle,” he adds.
Now he works as receptionist and takes pills to ensure his viral load of HIV does not develop into full-blown AIDS.
“I don’t have a long-term partner,” he says. “I have sex with men and use condoms. For me it’s not hard to find men in Chisinau. I never had problems.”
Sex on top
The number of new cases of HIV in Moldova is rising steadily, with between 700 – 800 new reported cases each year, although the real figure is much higher.
While the incidences of HIV is increasing among homosexuals – this is not a gay problem.
The vast majority of new cases are heterosexual and this year the largest number of new victims are women.
The route of transmission has also switched.
In 1996, 85 per cent of new cases were due to drug users sharing infected needles and only 15 per cent were due to sex.
Now 92 per cent of new cases are due to unprotected sex – and only five per cent from drug use.
The country’s drug users are more responsible – and have stopped sharing dirty syringes.
But a large part of the population refuses to strap on a prophylactic.
This is because Moldovans just don’t talk about sex enough – and here are four reasons why.
1. The Young: straight and protected – half the time
Youngsters do use condoms – but only some of the time. Serge, 17 from the southern Moldovan town of Cahul, does not use condoms with his current girlfriend.
“The best condoms in Moldova are expensive,” he says. “How can a student who has no money to buy a pack of condoms daily? I trust my current girlfriend and I never talked to her about the possibility of a disease – because she is a nice girl.”
Meanwhile 21 year-old Ludmila from the town of Glodeni, says that, yes, people know about HIV, but there is a wider stigma that embraces tradition and the attitudes to women in Moldovan society.
“Boys from Moldova are not used to carrying condoms – and for girls it’s shameful to have condoms,” she says. “So if a hook-up is not planned and neither person has condoms, we may have unprotected sex.”
In daily contact with new HIV cases is Lucia Pirtina, vice-director management HIV/AIDS in Chisinau’s Hospital for Dermatology and Infectious Diseases.
When she speaks to patients in her ward about how they contracted the virus through sex, the most common response she hears is that -‘I did not think that I needed to protect myself’.
“Because the media promotes the idea that HIV is among prostitutes, drug addicts and gays,” she says, “they think there is no risk because ‘I am not a prostitute, an addict or a gay.’”
2. Not gay, but sleeping with men: silent danger
Moldovan’s small homosexual community likes to talk – only between itself – but it likes to talk. They know they should use condoms and the risks of HIV – although not all are wrapping up safe.
Nevertheless there is a larger group of men who have sex with men (MSM) – and they do not gossip.
In total these men account for around ten per cent of new HIV cases – not a critical mass, but one of concern.
“Men who have sex with men don’t want to be seen,” says Roman, a consultant at Chisinau’s Regional Social Centre providing services for people living with HIV. “They don’t want to be open. Many have a family.”
But it’s clear they exist – and they are copulating.
Such men meet using social networks, such as Mamba, Planet Romeo and Odnoklassniki to hook up.
When registering for a website such as Planet Romeo, the webmaster asks the client to expose minutiae about his own personal appearance and what he desires in another man.
The client must describe his eye color, frame, height and style of body hair and reveal whether he wants anal sex, active or passive fisting, S&M and his preferred size of penis (or ‘member’, as it is called).
It even asks the client to elaborate on what fetishes he desires, such as ‘costumes’, ‘stockings’ or ‘skater’.
Men looking for casual sex with men are willing to share the tiniest of details about their preferences online, but nothing in real life.
Here the men have names such as ‘butch_dick_son’ and are looking for ‘naughty guys’ or ‘sex sex’.
Some pose with selfies of naked bodies, head concealed, their ‘member’ flopping free – while others use their faces and real names, stating they ‘want to chat’.
It’s a mix of open and closeted, gay and MSM.
There are hundreds of such accounts online.
For Vaeceslav Mulear, coordinator of Health Problems at LGBT NGO Genderdoc, his team supplies condoms and advice to homosexuals at cruising grounds in Chisinau.
But he says he cannot cover all MSM in their services. It’s a disparate and closed group.
“They do not want to get tested for HIV,” he says. “They don’t want to recognize who they are.”
3. Migrants: what goes on in Volgograd, stays in Volgograd
Moldova is a migrant country. Up to 615,000 of its citizens are working or residing abroad. This is a staggering 17 per cent of the entire population, half of whom travel to EU countries and the others mainly to Russia.
Men tend to go east, where over two-thirds labour in the building trade.
“They work on construction sites, tend not to have high education, they do not know the place where they are staying and they are disorientated in another country,” says Lucia Pirtina.
Sometimes up to 20 men stay together in one apartment and there are few opportunities for fun in the evenings – except vodka and prostitutes – and when we are talking about prostitutes, don’t expect Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman for these Moldovan migrants on a building site in Nizhny Novgorod.
When they come home, they keep quiet about what happened.
A worrying phenomenon is that married women in remote rural areas in Moldova who have only had one sexual partner find out at a clinic that they have HIV.
Some of their husbands are coming back to Moldova with the virus – and are infecting their wives.
This fits with research from 2010, which states only around 4.5 per cent of Moldovan wives admitted to using condoms with their husband.
Work migration puts open communication between partners under strain – and the result is HIV.
“That is our tragedy,” says Pirtina.
4. Marriage: bonded by mistrust
A failure of men to be open with their wives is contributing to the spread of the disease.
This can be put down to an excess of pride and a lack of importance placed on the need to communicate.
This is evident in an example below – researched from court reports and conversations with individuals close to the case (names have been changed).
Liana and Petrov were friends from childhood living in a small town in the north of Moldova.
She left to Russia, aged 16, with her mother. At the same time, the police caught Petrov stealing and a judge sentenced him to jail.
But they kept up a correspondence – and she visited him inside, taking him packets of goods and keeping his spirits high.
When he was released, she joined his parents to meet him outside the prison gates.
Although some in the town warned her against him, she was in love – and believed that he could change and make a good husband.
Before a wedding, it used to be mandatory in Moldova for couples to have an HIV test. At that time, the state’s assumption was that people do not have sex before marriage.
Petrov picked up the test results for both of them, which showed he was HIV positive and she was clear.
He did not tell her about his status.
After the wedding, Liana worked as a hairdresser. She was making a good living and was excited about having children.
However Petrov turned to heavy drinking and drugs, spending his time out in bars – and frequently came home wasted, stoned and angry.
She spent more time away from Petrov, in the safe company of her mother and brothers, but kept going back to him.
One evening, in the presence of Liana’s mother, he hit his wife in the face and stomach. Her mother tried to protect her, but Petrov punched the older woman.
At this time, Petrov infected his wife with gonorrhea, leading her to believe he was cheating on her with other women.
She was planning to leave him and, in the middle of an argument, he told her:
“Why are you scared of gonorrhea? That’s nothing – you still don’t know that you could have HIV.”
Liana took an anonymous HIV test. The result was that she was positive.
She was afraid that she would be a burden to everyone close to her.
But one evening later, as every day, Liana came home from work and went to see her mother. They stayed to chat. She was in a better state of mind. Calm and level.
After talking, she left to her husband.
The mother remembered a phrase from that evening.
Liana told her:
“I’ve thought about it all and tomorrow all will change, all will be well.”
The mother thought she had made the decision to leave her husband.
The next day the mother telephoned Liana because she didn’t come by to see her after work. But there was no response.
All her friends and family began to search for her – but no one could find her in the town or its surroundings.
That evening the police announced that they had discovered a dead body crushed by a train on the railway tracks.
Liana left the note:
“My dears, forgive me please, especially you forgive me mother, I love you very much. Forgive me if you can. Please do not accuse anyone of my death.”
A legal organization specialized in HIV/AIDS litigation, IDOM, demonstrated in court that Petrov infected Liana deliberately. He professed his innocence, arguing that they both knew of his HIV status before the wedding.
The judge sentenced him to four years in prison – where he is now serving his sentence.
Michael Bird
Additional reporting by Oxana Greadcenco, thanks to Irina Titica and Elena Guțanu for Russian translation and to Natalia Mardari, Olesea Doronceanu, the team at Genderdoc and at the Regional Social Centres in Chisinau and Balti.
This article is supported by ‘Fortification of the independence of online mass-media in the Republic of Moldova through the transfter of Know-how from the EU’ (Moldova.ORG’s project)- with support from the ‘European Partnership for Democracy’ and financial resources from the ‘National Fund for Democracy’ (NED).
Society
“They are not needy, but they need help”. How Moldovan volunteers try to create a safe environment for the Ukrainian refugees
At the Government’s ground floor, the phones ring constantly, the laptop screens never reach standby. In one corner of the room there is a logistics planning meeting, someone has a call on Zoom with partners and donors, someone else finally managed to take a cookie and make some coffee. Everyone is exhausted and have sleepy red eyes, but the volunteers still have a lot of energy and dedication to help in creating a safe place for the Ukrainian refugees.
“It’s like a continuous bustle just so you won’t read the news. You get home sometimes and you don’t have time for news, and that somehow helps. It’s a kind of solidarity and mutual support,” says Vlada Ciobanu, volunteer responsible for communication and fundraising.
The volunteers group was formed from the very first day of war. A Facebook page was created, where all types of messages immediately started to flow: “I offer accommodation”, “I want to help”, “I want to get involved”, “Where can I bring the products?”, “I have a car and I can go to the customs”. Soon, the authorities also started asking for volunteers’ support. Now they all work together, coordinate activities and try to find solutions to the most difficult problems.
Is accommodation needed for 10, 200 or 800 people? Do you need transportation to the customs? Does anyone want to deliver 3 tons of apples and does not know where? Do you need medicine or mobile toilets? All these questions require prompt answers and actions. Blankets, sheets, diapers, hygiene products, food, clothes – people bring everything, and someone needs to quickly find ways of delivering them to those who need them.
Sometimes this collaboration is difficult, involves a lot of bureaucracy, and it can be difficult to get answers on time. “Republic of Moldova has never faced such a large influx of refugees and, probably because nobody thought this could happen, a mechanism of this kind of crisis has not been developed. Due to the absence of such a mechanism that the state should have created, we, the volunteers, intervened and tried to help in a practical way for the spontaneous and on the sport solutions of the problems,” mentions Ecaterina Luțișina, volunteer responsible for the refugees’ accommodation.
Ana Maria Popa, one of the founders of the group “Help Ukrainians in Moldova/SOS Українці Молдовa” says that the toughest thing is to find time and have a clear mind in managing different procedures, although things still happen somehow naturally. Everyone is ready to intervene and help, to take on more responsibilities and to act immediately when needed. The biggest challenges arise when it is necessary to accommodate large families, people with special needs, for which alternative solutions must be identified.
Goods and donations
The volunteers try to cope with the high flow of requests for both accommodation and products of all kinds. “It came to me as a shock and a panic when I found out that both mothers who are now in Ukraine, as well as those who found refuge in our country are losing their milk because of stress. We are trying to fill an enormous need for milk powder, for which the demand is high and the stocks are decreasing”, says Steliana, the volunteer responsible for the distribution of goods from the donation centers.
Several centers have been set up to collect donations in all regions of Chisinau, and volunteers are redirecting the goods to where the refugees are. A system for processing and monitoring donations has already been established, while the volunteer drivers take over the order only according to a unique code.
Volunteers from the collection centers also do the inventory – the donated goods and the distributed goods. The rest is transported to Vatra deposit, from where it is distributed to the placement centers where more than 50 refugees are housed.
When they want to donate goods, but they don’t know what would be needed, people are urged to put themselves in the position of refugees and ask themselves what would they need most if they wake up overnight and have to hurriedly pack their bags and run away. Steliana wants to emphasise that “these people are not needy, but these people need help. They did not choose to end up in this situation.”
Furthermore, the volunteer Cristina Sîrbu seeks to identify producers and negotiate prices for products needed by refugees, thus mediating the procurement process for NGOs with which she collaborates, such as Caritas, World Children’s Fund, Polish Solidarity Fund, Lifting hands, Peace Corps and others.
One of the challenges she is facing now is the identifying a mattress manufacturer in the West, because the Moldovan mattress manufacturer that has been helping so far no longer has polyurethane, a raw material usually imported from Russia and Ukraine.
Cristina also needs to find solutions for the needs of the volunteer groups – phones, laptops, gsm connection and internet for a good carrying out of activities.
Hate messages
The most difficult thing for the communication team is to manage the hate messages on the social networks, which started to appear more often. “Even if there is some sort of dissatisfaction from the Ukrainian refugees and those who offer help, we live now in a very diverse society, there are different kind of people, and we act very differently under stress,” said Vlada Ciobanu.
Translation by Cătălina Bîrsanu
Important
#WorldForUkraine – a map that shows the magnitude of the world’s actions against Russian aggression
The international community and volunteers from all over te world have launched #WorldForUkraine as a platform that shows the magnitude of the world’s actions against the Russian aggression. In a digital world – it is an interactive map of public support of Ukrainians under the hashtag #WorldForUkraine – rallies, flash mobs, protests around the world. In the physical dimension – it is your opportunity to take to the streets and declare: “No to Putin’s aggression, no to war.”
„Today, along with the political and military support, emotional connection with the civilized world and truthful information are extremely important for Ukraine. The power to do it is in your hands. Join the #WorldForUkraine project and contribute to the victorious battle against the bloodshed inflicted on Ukraine by the aggression of the Russian Federation”, says the „about the project” section of the platform.
Go to the streets — Tell people — Connect and Unite — Become POWERFUL
Volunteers have launched #WorldForUkraine as a platform that shows the magnitude of the world’s actions against Russian aggression. In digital world – it is an INTERACTIVE MAP of public support of Ukrainians worldforukraine.net under the hashtag #WorldForUkraine – rallies, flash mobs, protests around the world. In the physical dimension – it is your opportunity to take to the streets and declare: “No to Putin’s aggression, no to war.” There you may find information about past and future rallies in your city in support of Ukraine. This is a permanent platform for Ukrainian diaspora and people all over the world concerned about the situation in Ukraine.
So here’s a couple of things you could do yourself to help:
* if there is a political rally in your city, then participate in it and write about it on social media with geolocation and the hashtag #WorldForUkraine
* if there are no rallies nearby, organize one in support of Ukraine yourself, write about it on social media with geolocation adding the hashtag #WorldForUkraine
The map will add information about gathering by #WorldForUkraine AUTOMATICALLY
Your voice now stronger THAN ever
All rallies are already here: https://worldforukraine.net
Important
How is Moldova managing the big influx of Ukrainian refugees? The authorities’ plan, explained
From 24th to 28th of February, 71 359 Ukrainian citizens entered the territory of Republic of Moldova. 33 173 of them left the country. As of this moment, there are 38 186 Ukrainian citizens in Moldova, who have arrived over the past 100 hours.
The Moldovan people and authorities have organized themselves quickly from the first day of war between Russia and Ukraine. However, in the event of a prolonged armed conflict and a continuous influx of Ukrainian refugees, the efforts and donations need to be efficiently managed. Thus, we inquired about Moldova’s long-term plan and the state’s capacity to receive, host, and treat a bigger number of refugees.
On February 26th, the Ministry of Labor and Social Protection of Moldova approved the Regulation of organization and functioning of the temporary Placement Center for refugees and the staffing and expenditure rules. According to the Regulation, the Centers will have the capacity of temporary hosting and feeding at least 20 persons, for a maximum of 3 months, with the possibility of extending this period. The Centers will also offer legal, social, psychological, and primary medical consultations to the refugees. The Center’s activity will be financed from budget allocations, under Article 19 of Provision no. 1 of the Exceptional Situations Commission from February 24th, 2022, and from other sources of funding that do not contravene applicable law.
The Ministry of Inner Affairs and the Government of Moldova facilitated the organization of the volunteers’ group “Moldova for Peace”. Its purpose is to receive, offer assistance and accommodation to the Ukrainian refugees. The group is still working on creating a structure, registering and contacting volunteers, etc. It does not activate under a legal umbrella.
Lilia Nenescu, one of the “Moldova for Peace” volunteers, said that the group consists of over 20 people. Other 1700 registered to volunteer by filling in this form, which is still available. The group consists of several departments:
The volunteers’ department. Its members act as fixers: they’re responsible for connecting the people in need of assistance with the appropriate department. Some of the volunteers are located in the customs points. “The Ministry of Inner Affairs sends us every day the list of the customs points where our assistance is needed, and we mobilize the volunteers”, says Lilia Nenescu.
The Goods Department manages all the goods donated by the Moldavian citizens. The donations are separated into categories: non-perishable foods and non-food supplies. The volunteers of this department sort the goods into packages to be distributed.
The Government intends to collect all the donations in four locations. The National Agency for Food Safety and the National Agency for Public Health will ensure mechanisms to confirm that all the deposited goods comply with safety and quality regulations.
The Service Department operates in 4 directions and needs the volunteer involvement of specialists in psychology, legal assistance (the majority of the refugees only have Ukrainian ID and birth certificates of their children); medical assistance; translation (a part of the refugees are not Ukrainian citizens).
According to Elena Mudrîi, the spokesperson of the Ministry of Health, so far there is no data about the number of Covid-19 positive refugees. She only mentioned two cases that needed outpatient medical assistance: a pregnant woman and the mother of a 4-day-old child.
The Accommodation Department. The volunteers are waiting for the centralized and updated information from the Ministry of Labor about the institutions offering accommodation, besides the houses offered by individuals.
The Transport Department consists of drivers organized in groups. They receive notifications about the number of people who need transportation from the customs points to the asylum centers for refugees.
The municipal authorities of Chișinău announced that the Ukrainian children refugees from the capital city will be enrolled in educational institutions. The authorities also intend to create Day-Care Centers for children, where they will be engaged in educational activities and will receive psychological assistance. Besides, the refugees from the municipal temporary accommodation centers receive individual and group counseling.
In addition to this effort, a group of volunteers consisting of Ana Gurău, Ana Popapa, and Andrei Lutenco developed, with the help of Cristian Coșneanu, the UArefugees platform, synchronized with the responses from this form. On the first day, 943 people offered their help using the form, and 110 people asked for help. According to Anna Gurău, the volunteers communicate with the Government in order to update the platform with the missing data.
Translation from Romanian by Natalia Graur
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