Global Activism: Fighting AIDS in Malawi
By The ArchivesGlobal Activism: Fighting AIDS in Malawi
By The Archives
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In order to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS, it’s not enough to offer better treatment, or better access to Anti-Retroviral medicines. Better treatments are great, but real prevention means you need to stop new infections from occurring.
Dr. Kathleen Norr is the Malawi program coordinator for UIC’s AIDS International Training and Research Program, a collaboration between universities in Malawi to educate public health workers and build research and training infrastructure. Dr. Chrissie Kaponda is a 1996 graduate of the UIC college of nursing and the Department Head of Maternal Child Nursing at the Kamuzu College of Nursing. She’s the Malawi Country Coordinator of Mzake ind Mzake–which means “Friend to Friend.”
Mzake ind Mzake Peer Group Intervention for HIV Prevention combines health care with research into gender inequality and social learning.
Using the next-door district as a control, the group acts like an educational “chain letter.” First, it educates health care workers at a large, state-run hospital. Then, those workers use the same curriculum of human sexuality, IV transmission and condom use to teach workers at five rural clinics and leaders in nearby villages. In the next phase, nearly 2,000 adults in the community were trained.