Something on HIV and AIDS: Can this really work?

POSITION PAPER PRESENTED BY:LEVI SIMON PHIRI ON NOVEMBER 30, 2009

Perceived strategies in support of children infected and affected with HIV and AIDS

Executive summary
It is ironically a fact that over and around 80,000 children under the age bracket 15 years are HIV positive in Malawi alone. Also statistics show that over 1.2 million is the number of children orphaned due to HIV/AIDS across the country.

HIV/AIDS has continued to wreck havoc on the lives of many people and children too have not been spared. Efforts to curb down the impact of the HIV/AIDS epidemic has always been there, but still not enough has been achieved to the extent that the number of children being infected with HIV and/or affected has induced annually.

Bottlenecks experienced by children infected and affected with HIV/AIDS
Children living with or affected with HIV/AIDS face the following challenges:-
Malnutrition
Sexual exploitation/abuse
Domestic violence
Property grabbing
Lack of parental care/guidance
Lack of education on child rights
Juvenile delinquency
Lack of access to anti retroviral treatment
Lack of succession plans by their sick parents before death occurs
Basic social amenities i.e.
o Shelter
o Food
o Clothes
o Dropping out from school
o Security
o Stress/trauma
o Child headed families
o Early or forced marriages
o Economic dependency
o Stigma and discrimination among many others.

Sustainable strategies in support of children living with HIV/AIDS
1. Culturally, extended family support has proved to be the sole intervention in giving full and complete care and support to the infected children. However, every opportunity has a disadvantage of some kind, where civic education has gone very well children infected with HIV/AIDS have lived a happy life and helped them to build resilience.

2. Community support also compliments very well in taking care of the infected children in different households. However, where support and/ or resources is limited not all the children have received the necessary support.

Children living with HIV and AIDS or affected by the pandemic require the following support in order to stay a meaningful life:-

Spiritual support
Patronizing places where people are congregating to worship to God for instance.

Economic support
Creating activities that would generate money in order to improve children’s living standard-self economic reliance like provision of micro loan facilities to the children/guardians, etc.

Physical support
Access to treatment, care and support from both the extended family members and the community (emotional support)

Social support
Creating a conducive atmosphere which enables the children stay without fear or threats: this can include
Psychosocial support, playing games (equipment modern or improvised) drawing pictures the idea is to build resilience, a coping mechanism-talking to children about death (story telling)

STRATEGY THREE
Communicating with children about sensitive issues using the right tools- i.e. talking to children about death, preparing children for their own or loved one’s death and supporting children after death of a loved one using folklores, drama, plays, working one-one with a child, working with a family, etc.


STRATEGY FOUR
Use of traditional approaches in counseling traumatized children where key and influential calibers are involved in order to bring sanity and oneness in caring for children living with or affected by HIV/AIDS.

SUSTAINABILITY RELATED TO THE DESIGNED STRATEGIES
 Setting various viable Income generating activities
 Crop and animal husbandry
 Extended family and community self help programs with vigorous civic education on the importance of personal commitment and involvement
 Vocational and life skills training (capacity building)
 Child corner or group therapy meetings
 Establishment of early child centers/CBCCs
 Encourage memory book writing
 Capacity building for guardians and counseling
 Food security through use of organic fertilizer (manure) banana materials/products.