In order to combat ignorance on the menace of HIV/AIDS, CDC(2012) stated the following:
- Preventive education programmes should reach everyone-especially young people, among whom about half of all new HIV infections are occurring. The best educational programmes seek to empower women by providing them with information, skills and services that help them protect themselves.
- If HIV/AIDS preventive education is to be effective, it must occur through all avenues of education (formal and non-formal), through schools and through broader community channels with strong political support. It should also match the various linguistic, social and cultural realities of the groups being addressed.
- Since people have different frames of reference, preventive information cannot be of a one-size-fits-all variety. It has to be customized for different audiences. Surveys and assessment studies that reveal the local dynamics of the epidemic and that identify local attitudes and needs make it possible to tailor prevention messages effectively.
- Information campaigns and skill-building are important elements of preventive education. The scope of the epidemic means that such campaigns should involve the public and private sectors, as well as non-governmental organizations, on a scale unparalleled in the history of communication.
- Preventive education therefore has to include teachers and others working in education, as well as their families.
- Preventive education must take into account and help change engrained cultural habits that leave sections of society (particularly women) more vulnerable to infection and less able to cope with the effects of the disease. Misguided notions of masculinity, for example, often deprive women and girls of control over their bodies.
- All educational programmes must reach girls and women to equip them with the information and skills that can help them protect themselves against HIV/AIDS.
- It is crucial that the protection of human rights serves as the basis for education campaigns to stop the exclusion of people living with HIV/AIDS and give them access to care.
Reference
Centre for Diseases Prevention and Control (CDC) (2012). Opportunistic infections and Kaposi’s sarcoma among Haitians in the United States.MMWRMorb Mortal WklyRep. ,31 (26), 353–354.