AVERT PDF Print E-mail

AVERT is an international AIDS charit

 with HIV & AIDS projects in southern Africa. Our HIV and AIDS projects have a particular emphasis on sustainable, cost-effective community responses to HIV & AIDS. Each HIV and AIDS project is developed and run according to the specific needs of the area by people who are local to the area. This page outlines some of AVERT's HIV & AIDS projects in South Africa, Malawi and Zimbabwe.

 

South Africa

Sisonke
Based in the poor Eastern Cape province of South Africa, Sisonke is a large community based project driven by the energy and insight of small local community groups who are responding to evolving local needs and challenges. Sisonke works to strengthen and empower these groups to develop their HIV/AIDS interventions, and supports them in providing education and care in their communities.

Through these local groups, Sisonke is reaching out to, and working to meet the needs of over 800 orphans and vulnerable children, who are being looked after in the community. Training and support is being provided for the extended families, guardians and care-givers of these children in terms of HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, support and care activities, as well as helping them meet their own needs through income generation and psychosocial support. Sisonke is also helping local people affected by, and infected with, HIV and AIDS to attain long-term sustainability through increased food security. Groups of local people are contributing their own time to establish gardens and community feeding schemes for the most vulnerable and AVERT has helped to provide some of the tools for these community initiatives, such as cooking stoves, large pots and gardening tools.

An increasing proportion of care for people with AIDS is having to be provided at home by immediate family and friends, so Sisonke is helping them to have training which educates them on how to care for sick and disabled people at home. This includes learning about proper opportunistic infections, pain control and nutrition, as well as staying safe as a carer. The people who have received training then pass on their skills to other carers in their area.

Older people are increasingly playing a major role in caring for younger adults sick with AIDS, and for their orphaned grandchildren. Through Sisonke a number of elderly care-givers came together and created the ‘Gogogetters’ (gogo is Xhosa for grandmother) group. The ‘Gogogetters’ support each other with the skills and knowledge they need to care for their orphaned grandchildren.

Mpfuxelelo
The Mpfuxelelo project is a health infrastructure project located in a rural and remote area of the Mpumalanga province of South Africa. The project is working to improve the HIV/AIDS services at Tintswalo Hospital where there is a huge demand for HIV/AIDS services, as there are an estimated 15,000-18,000 people living with HIV and AIDS in the area who are currently in need of treatment.

Mpfuxelelo’s activities are carried out by trained staff and counsellors drawn from the local community, and they offer education, support and access to treatment to all who need it. Mpfuxelelo members also attend community HIV/AIDS meetings and events, and visit community based HIV/AIDS organisations and other groups. Mpfuxelelo identifies and supports potential, new or active community HIV/AIDS interventions.

Particularly important are the peer educators, trained by Mpfuxelelo to provide essential HIV/AIDS information to hospital workers, day visitors, in-patients and out-patients. Mpfuxelelo also provides HIV counselling and testing services through caring and supportive lay counsellors. These counsellors promote HIV risk-reduction and safer health and sexual practices among non-infected adults and children, as well as supporting prevention of mother to child transmission activities and conducting many tasks previously conducted by hospital nurses, thereby increasing the time they have for caring for patients. HIV positive people are identified, supported and appropriately referred to relevant hospital departments for care and treatment.

The OSCAR Project
The Outreach Social Care Project (OSCAR) has been operating in and around the South African City of Pietermaritzburg, in KwaZulu Natal since 2007. OSCAR principally works with Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVCs) and child headed households, providing assistance in gaining access to education, legal assistance, social grants and other services alongside psychological support and peer education.
OSCAR has a team of 30 care givers and 20 community volunteers who have received training in opportunistic infection control, nutrition, first aid, home based care and counselling. The community volunteers facilitate the HIV prevention work alongside providing home based care and counselling support.

OSCAR also works with teachers in the Pietermaritzburg area, giving training on HIV and AIDS, how to work with OVCs and increasing sensitivity towards the issues faced by OVCs.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ,
www.avert.org