DanChurchAid
HIV/AIDS
Lessons learnt
Recent observations in Tanzania’s Kagera region and in different parts of Zambia , where DanChurchAid and its partners have developed a range of HIV prevention and control activities, also indicate a considerable positive impact.
Gender and human rights
Besides the statistics, the design and scope of the Kagera Zonal AIDS Control
Project in
Tanzania
and the CHAZ AIDS Care and Prevention Programme in
Zambia
incorporate the key words illustrating the cost-effectiveness of HIV/AIDS prevention and control projects and programmes like horizontality, cross-sectoriality, multi-disciplinarity and the investment in a range of complementary project components, aiming at achieving a balance between primary and secondary preventive interventions.
Both programmes incorporate the cross-cutting elements of gender and human rights mainstreaming of all programme activities.
A multifaceted approach makes a difference in Tanzania
Recently published scientific documentation appears to reflect a trend towards a declining number of newly infected persons in the Kagera Region, when compared to the national average of Tanzania. The declining incidence may be a reflection of the multifaceted interventions by many different agencies in the Kagera Region ever since the beginning of the epidemic in the late 1980s.
Evidently, it will be very difficult to draw conclusions as to the comparative effectiveness and impact of individual HIV prevention projects. However, there is merit in assuming that the DanChurchAid supported Kagera Zonal AIDS Control Project has contributed significantly to the reversal of the epidemiological trends. The reason for this assumption is that the project meets the majority of the criteria, which in public health sciences are considered significant, when trying to optimise effectiveness, impact and sustainability of preventive interventions.
DanChurchAid has supported the Kagera Zonal AIDS Control Project for more than ten years. The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Tanzania is implementing the control project, and its main objective is to limit the spread of HIV/AIDS through information and to limit the negative social impact of HIV/AIDS.
The project focus in Tanzania
The project consists of four components: information on HIV/AIDS, especially to children and youth from ten years of age; information on the human rights and support to legal aid in relation to violation of these rights, predominantly in relation to bereaved widows and children; home based care and counselling is also an important component, and last but not least social support to people living with HIV/AIDS and bereaved women and children.
A community based survey in the Kagera region in 1987 showed, that 24.2 per cent of the adults in Bukoba Town were infected with HIV. In the rural district of Bukoba the percentage was 10. Comparative surveys were carried out in 1993 and 1996 and indicated a clear downward trend, with a recorded urban prevalence in 1993 of 18.3 per cent. In the rural district of Bukoba the number of infected people was 6.8 per cent in 1996.
On the basis of these findings, a follow-up study was conducted which included analyses of behavioural factors. It was found that condom use had increased significantly in the studied group of people, and the proportion of persons getting married increased over time, while the age at first sexual intercourse in the study group increased.
Based on analyses of these data by a group of researchers at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and Umeå University in Sweden, a cautious conclusion might be that ongoing interventions in the area, leading to behavioural changes, may have contributed to the documented and favourable trends in HIV prevalence.
