INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Image copyrightGetty ImagesJust a few weeks ago, "Joyce" received a phone call that threw her life in the air.Joyce is HIV positive, and was
told in the call that this information - along with details of more than 14,000 other infected people in Singapore - had been made public in
a massive data breach."I'm still very shocked and sad at how this happened," Joyce told the TheIndianSubcontinent
"How is it that the place that I thought was safe is now not safe for us" The scandal has gripped the Singaporean media for weeks.The
government has blamed the leak on the American partner of a local doctor, who had access to the records kept on all known HIV-positive
Authorities say the leak has been contained, but this is little relief to a vulnerable community in a society that continues to stigmatise
the condition.Image copyrightAFPImage caption
The data leak raised questions about how safely Singapore stores data on
its citizens
Joyce, who didn't want her real name or nationality revealed, contracted HIV more than two decades ago from a
boyfriend who went on to die from it.She says she was unaware of her condition when she married her Singaporean husband and moved here with
After a series of illnesses in the 1990s, her husband suggested they both take an HIV test.It took a week to get the results."My English was
very poor so they didn't call me but called my husband to tell him
He came home from work and said that he had good news and bad news."The bad news was that she had tested positive
The good news, he said, was that even though he hadn't, he would support her emotionally and financially
"I asked him, are you sure This means we have no family, no children
But he said what was more important is that he needed a good wife who was kind and understanding
I thanked God for it."Joyce spent the next few years in and out of Singapore's Communicable Disease Centre, where she saw some of her
As a permanent resident, her medical care is subsidised but remains expensive
She knows some foreign spouses who had to leave because of the cost
As required by law, Joyce's HIV status was added to a national database
The HIV registry was set up in 1985 by the Ministry of Health to keep track of the infection situation and trace potential cases.It was this
database - with the names and addresses of 14,200 people - that authorities say was leaked earlier this year
Image copyrightEPAImage caption
Singapore says it will "spare no effort" to bring Farrera-Brochez to justice
The government has pinned the blame on Mikhy Farrera-Brochez, a US citizen who moved to Singapore in 2008
They say he obtained the data from his partner, Singaporean doctor Ler Teck Siang, whose job granted him rare access to the confidential
registry.Farrera-Brochez is himself HIV-positive, which means he could not legally work in Singapore
But in 2017 he was convicted of fraud for using a sample of Ler's blood to pass a mandatory HIV test
After serving a jail term he was deported to the US
Ler is appealing against a two-year sentence for his role in the fraud
Farrera-Brochez - who this week appeared in court in Kentucky charged with trespassing at his mother's house - has fiercely denied being
He recently shared a string of angry posts on Facebook alleging that, among other things, another person was behind the leak, that he was
abused while in police custody, that he had only contracted HIV while in prison and that he was denied medication
He accused Singapore - where sex between men is illegal - of using the HIV database to keep track of gay men
Facebook has since deleted Farrera-Brochez's account for violating its community standards, and Singaporean authorities have said his
allegations are "blatantly false"
Health Minister Gan Kim Yong said Singapore was working with the US on the case and police would "spare no effort pursuing all avenues to
bring Farrera-Brochez to justice".A total ban on HIV-infected people entering Singapore was only lifted in 2015
Foreigners with HIV are not allowed to work in Singapore - unless like Joyce, they have permanent residency or are married to a Singaporean
Critics say this counts as discrimination, at a time when the virus can be controlled with medication.Avin Tan was one of the first
Singaporeans to publicly come out about his HIV status
Now an activist with Action for Aids, he says living with the social stigma is challenging.Image caption
HIV/Aids
activist Avin Tan says HIV patients have little protection against discrimination
"There are a lot of laws that dictate what
We need to come out to our sex partners, our insurers, our employers and our health-care givers but there are no laws to protect us once we
come out."Since the news of the leak, Action for Aids has been inundated with calls."A lot of people have been calling us crying, so worried
that their children might find out, that their spouse would react
"People are worried about employers finding out, insurers and their friends finding out
What's going to happen Are they going to be blackmailed Are they going to be threatened I think there was a lot of fear."Avin, like Joyce,
only learned of the leak when the health ministry alerted him
But what has angered many was that the ministry had known that Farrera-Brochez had the information since 2016
The health ministry rejected allegations of a cover up.It said it had "judged that on balance, an announcement then would not serve the
interests of the affected individuals, when weighed against the inevitable anxiety and distress they would experience".Image caption
Dr Leo Yee Sin says the community must be challenged over HIV stigmas
For a country that prides itself on its
efficiency, the leak has been deeply embarrassing
It comes not long after a series of lapses including a major health data breach last year which saw the personal medical information of 1.5
million patients, including the prime minister, leaked
The scandal has brought up many questions about how the city uses and safeguards such records.At Singapore's brand new state-of-the art
centre for handling communicable disease outbreaks, there is disquiet
Dr Leo Yee Sin, who runs it, has worked with HIV positive patients since the outbreak first reached Singapore's shores in the 1980s
She says safeguards have been put in place which restrict doctors from accessing such confidential data
But she, too, admits that the real problem is how people living with HIV are treated by society."HIV-positive persons still face a lot of
They find it very difficult to be accepted by society, so it's important for us to pick this up and challenge the community, because the
stigma comes from the community."But this might come too late for HIV sufferers like Joyce, who now lives in fear of her husband losing his
job because of her condition
Asked if she believes them when they assure her the leak has been contained, she says it's 50/50."I got calls from others in my support
group who said their families don't know, my kids don't know, my colleagues don't know, so now this information could still be out there to
ruin our lives."This is confidential information and they were supposed to protect us
I have lost trust in the system, not just here but it's all over the world
Everywhere there is no trust."
