Imagine waking up to find white patches spreading across your skin — and knowing they’ll never go away. That's the reality for 24-year-old Aliyah Babu, who developed vitiligo at 18. In Uganda, where many still wrongly link vitiligo to witchcraft, she has faced cruel stigma and discrimination. But Aliyah refuses to hide.#GirlZOffMute #77Percent
00:02Or imagine how it feels like to be living with vitiligo?
00:06This is a skin condition where pale white patches appear on the skin.
00:11Aliyah Babu is living with vitiligo.
00:14She is 22 and will take us through how life has been since she got it.
00:23When did you first notice the signs of vitiligo and what was your reaction to it?
00:28That was 2020 when I noticed that I was developing vitiligo.
00:32Though I didn't know that it was vitiligo by then because I would get skin patches in different spots.
00:39It started with the back and the chest.
00:42I was in school so I called my mum and informed her about it.
00:47She told me to come home for some check-ups.
00:51Have you ever encountered moments whereby people just stare at you?
00:56That's a daily life I'm living right now because I expect everyone to always notice me.
01:02Wherever I move they have to stare at me because I'm quite different.
01:07I think I'm now used. That's what I can say. I accept it the way I am.
01:13You have been with this condition for five years, right?
01:17How have you been able to build your self-confidence and accept the way you are?
01:23It has really been difficult for me to accept who I am.
01:27And at this point I won't lie to anyone that every day I'm fine.
01:33Because sometimes I'm okay, sometimes I'm sad.
01:37Because whenever I look at myself in a mirror and I notice that the earlier I was is now a different earlier.
01:45And I'm living in a life where I face discrimination, where some people do not accept who I am for now.
01:55It is sad but I think I just live in faith and hopes and I decided to accept the new me, the me, right now.
02:04Would you say that there are some stigmas associated with the disease due to culture?
02:10Yeah, there are very many cause.
02:13I personally have tried getting jobs like in different places but they always reject me because of the skin condition.
02:22They always think maybe if we give you this kind of job here our customers will not come, eh?
02:30Like they have those beliefs of theirs so I have faced it and people are still ignorant about it.
02:39People still think it is contagious.
02:42You are on medication, right?
02:44No.
02:46I was once on the medication but it was very expensive for me so I decided to quit though.
02:53Honestly, I as a person I had started seeing an improvement.
02:58Since you have had this skin condition for over five years now, what advice would you give to someone who has recently been diagnosed with vitiligo or struggling with it?
03:13It has been a process for me to heal and accept who I am. Everyone will always stare at me but I have accepted it and I don't feel any stress about it anymore but it has been a process for me to reach to that point so it is good for them to go through it and accept the way you are.
03:32Do you think that there has been enough awareness of vitiligo not only here in Uganda but maybe across Africa?
03:42I feel like we still have a long, long, long way to create awareness about vitiligo for sure because most parts of Uganda where I move, people, different villages, I feel like everyone is looking at me, everyone is scared, people are running, even in Kampala it is a city but still people are still ignorant about it wherever you are moving people have to stare at you, the kids have to make jokes.
04:09I have just been speaking to Aliyah who is living with vitiligo. So I want to ask whether you can make us understand this skin disorder better.
04:20A vitiligo is an autoimmune skin disorder. What that means is that someone's immune system begins to attack the skin cells which give us colour, which give the skin colour. So your immune system is fighting against those skin cells then someone gets to lose the skin colour in a particular section or particular part of the body.
04:46Once you get it, how fast does it spread?
04:50In different people it could happen for a short time then it stops, in other people unfortunately it keeps spreading to different and increasing in size and to different other areas of the body. So there is no clear answer for that.
05:04Is the disease contagious?
05:06No, vitiligo is not contagious. You cannot get it by touching someone or being close to someone. No it is not.
05:12Is vitiligo curable?
05:14So far it is not curable. But in certain areas there is where we can achieve some success as far as the treatments that we are using in the areas that have lost skin getting back their skin colour.
05:30So at times we can have some limited success, although if it is in certain areas it is quite very difficult to get back that skin colour.