Mae Sot is an active border town with Burma as well as a special economic zone. Numerous migrants cross from the town of Myawaddy on the Burma side to find work in Thailand; many migrants end up working in Mae Sot area, others simply pass through it as a transit point. There are also numerous migrant communities in Mae Sot composed mainly of families.

The Mae Tao Clinic provides medical support for migrant PLHAs who find out their HIV status through the clinic. Pregnant women who are HIV positive are given ARV under the prevention of mother to child to transmission (PMTCT) program, which is jointly administered by the hospital and the clinic. Pregnant women and new mothers are also provided powdered milk, bottles and diapers, and the clinic also provides treatment and medicine for relief of opportunistic infections, as well as some home-based care. Although the clinic is able to assist with the medical aspect of health, it cannot assist with the social element of health.

To fill this gap, the clinic refers PLHAs to World Vision Foundation Thailand 's PLHA support group for migrants. Members of the group are provided supplemental financial support to help with provision of food, and the group brings migrant PLHAs together providing them the opportunity to openly discuss problems related to having HIV. The group's limit is fifty families, yet at least another twenty families who have passed through the Mae Tao Clinic are on a waiting list to become members of World Vision's support group.

A core group of members are also volunteers who help provide home-based care to the other members. The following are interviews with these volunteers.

This woman is a home-based care volunteer. She stays in Myawaddy on the Burma side, and goes back and forth taking care of migrant PLHAs on both sides of the border. She is thirty-two years old and has five children ranging in age from eleven years old to just over one-year old. Prior to her pregnancy with the last child, she had been working in Rangoon for over a year. Once she was pregnant, she came back to the border. Her husband works as a transporter at the border, assisting with loading and unloading goods being ferried across the Moei River.

She learned of her HIV status about two months prior to giving birth to her last child. She went to attend the antenatal clinic at the Mae Tao Clinic and received HIV counseling and testing there as part of the services. Upon learning that she has HIV, she was referred to World Vision's support group.

This woman comes across the border weekly for PLHA meetings at World Vision's center, and to receive milk powder from the clinic as part of the PMTCT program run through the Mae Tao Clinic.

Part of her motivation to do this type of work is because she feels sympathy for her friends (the other PLHAs). She attributes her devotion to being a volunteer to her desire to be productive and help others, which, she concedes, also gets her out of the house and keeps her busy. Without this meaningful busy work she fears she would fall prey to depression. She intends to continue as a home-based care volunteer, and, if given the chance, would be willing to work in a factory or other small jobs to make more money to help support her family.

This Burmese woman from Plijon Island, near Mwalyamyne in Mon State, has been in Mae Sot for two and a half years. She worked in Bangkok for three years prior to coming to the border (she did not mention what work she did in Bangkok ). This woman is thirty-nine years old and has an eight year old boy and a nine month year-old daughter. When she crossed the border she would go through the Kawthaung-Ranong border area in the South.