NGO launches study to tackle HIV/AIDS-related stigma and poverty
MASAKA– International Centre for Child Health and Development [ICHAD] has launched a five-year- research study code-named ”Suubi Stronger Families” aimed at fighting poverty, strengthening financial stability and parenting in families affected by HIV/AIDS in greater Masaka region.
The study runs from 2022 to 2027 and targets families in poor communities where 1000 children [10-14years] in mid-upper primary, from 30 primary schools will be recruited in the districts of Lwengo, Rakai, Kalungu, Sembabule, Bukomansimbi, Lyantonde, Kalangala, Kyotera and Masaka which make-up greater Masaka region.
The Founding Director of ICHAD, Prof. Fred Ssewamala said many families affected by HIV/AIDS also have children living with HIV and poor and they are stigmatized with no hope that their future holds promise. ”Poverty has caused mental challenges among these children and given the lack of mental health resources and they ended up dropping out of schools,” he said.
Ssewamala said the study programme funded by the National Institute of Mental Health will address HIV/AIDS-associated stigma and poverty in families with children who have the virus and ensure that children are healthy, stay in school and develop well into productive citizens.
He added that the programme will examine the mechanisms by which economic empowerment and family strengthening interventions target social, familial, and context-specific drivers affecting childhood behavioural health among adolescents in primary schools.
He also said they want to strengthen the capacity of families to raise their children in a respective way. He said this study will use family strengthening-based multiple groups to come together in addressing issues of child-raising and care.
The programme will address poverty and improvement of public health for children and adolescents. ”We want to see that families are financially stable and be able to solve problems affecting their households,” he said.
He said the caregivers of the children can use the money to pay for school fees, buy medicines, and food and initiate other income-generating projects. ”If these families with children living with HIV/AIDS are financially stable, they can be able to get enough food for the children, meet treatment-related expenses including transportation to clinics and pay for other school-related fees that will make a child stay in school,” he said.
He said ICHAD is currently helping children to open up what is called ”matched children’s saving accounts” in banks like Stanbic and Equity bank so that each child can have an account where the parents or caregivers can save some little and the organization top-up.
Florence Namuwonge, a teacher at Kyotera Primary School, said they have many pupils living with HIV/AIDS and whose families are too poor. She is hopeful the programme will help parents to raise money for the basic needs of their children.
She also said that teachers are also going to be sensitized on how to handle children living with HIV/AIDS, more so to fight cases of discrimination and stigmatisation in schools.
Rose Namugenyi, one of the parents in Masaka district, said her family that has HIV/AIDS positive children is engulfed in abject poverty. She said they sometimes fail to get food and this, she said, has affected the health of the already sick children.
”If my children get enough food [balanced diet], their viral load in their blood can be suppressed but now am finding it hard to buy food,” she worried.
Masaka Catholic Diocesan Bishop, Serverus Jjumba thanked ICHAD for the initiative, saying it will economically empower poor families, reduce school drop-outs, child labour and early marriages.
https://thecooperator.news/man-with-covid-19-symptoms-dies-at-masaka-hospital/
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