Source: AllAfrica
Saratu Dauda Aliyu, a 26 year old native of Nasarawo quarters in Gombe metropolis was until recently unaware about the scourge of HIV and AIDS other than a radio jingle being aired intermittently on the local radio and television. She's neither aware about ways of contracting the disease nor means of protecting herself against it.
She told this reporter that until a recent sensitization by a peer educator (PE) in their area, most boys and girls live reckless and uninformed life about the risk as well as consequences of acquiring the dreaded HIV/AIDS virus let alone conduct a test in order to know their status.
Gombe State is one of the few states identified by a World Bank research in 2005 with a high urban and rural prevalence rate of 7.0 and 3.1% respectively among young people. The national prevalence rate in 2005 was 4.4%, specific age prevalence among young people 15 to 19 years and 20 to 24 years was 4.7% and 3.6% respectively.
It's in the same vein that the World Bank funded United Nation's Children Fund (UNICEF) to select four endemic states of Gombe, Akwa Ibom,Cross River and Kaduna to train two hundred out of school youth (OSY) between the ages of 19 to 25 in four focus communities each to serve as peer enlightenment agents that will carry the HIV/AIDS massages to their families and their entire communities through peer discussions followed by intermittent football matches and local radio programmes.
A field officer of the UNICEF CIDA funded project, Mr Kalu, told the audience during a recent report presentation that the field office in Bauchi has been collaborating with all stakeholders in Gombe State through funds committed by the World Bank to focus on out of school youth as HIV peer educators because they are found to be the most vulnerable group of people in the society.
Daily Trust investigation revealed that while most of the trained peer educators serving as behavior change agents have succeeded in carrying out the massage to their peers through the temples and other family influences which increased the level of awareness and provide a platform for discourse and agreement on sustainable healthy behavior that reduces infection and re-infection among young people, more need to be done to stem the spread of the disease in the state.
In the two communities of Nasarawo and Bolari in Gombe metropolis and those of Kwalkwa in Billiri local government visited by this reporter, most of the young men and women still felt reluctant to undergo status verification test because of the stigmatization still attached to those infected with the diseases.
Admittedly 60 to 65% of most of the peer educators and their educated peers have undergone the test with about 78% of them picking the messages from the trained out of school youth (OSY) and thereby beating the stigmatization level to about 40% there, however in most other areas it's still a taboo to publicly discuss the issue of HIV/AIDS.
19 year old Hadiza Isa confessed to this reporter also that, unless for the recent step up effort to sensitize via radio drama, football matches and peer education, she lived a very careless life, "But now as a PE I am responsible for the life of my peers and I learnt to control my behavior, in fact unwarranted pregnancy has reduced in our areas recently" she said.
Seventy four year old Mr Lucas Isyaku who spoke rather harshly after losing his 29 year old daughter to AIDS said "you need to stop HIV/AIDS drugs so that those who have the disease will die with it and stop spreading it to others, that will make them refrain from womanizing".
Hafsat Abba, a house wife in Bolari while commending UNICEF for the sensitization said the new approach compelled not only parents but the young generations who hitherto care less to always insist on HIV test before any marriage is consummated in order to avoid the risk of contracting the diseases.
Daily Trust reports that while the issue might have still helped in getting the out of school youth and their peers mobilized about the dangers of the scourge, a lot need to be done to scale up effort against the dreaded HIV/AIDS especially in reaching out to other areas through sensitization which has of recent become a serious issue in Gombe and its environs.
Most of those interviewed by Daily Trust opined that, though the new approach has assisted in fighting the scourge, more communities and religious leaders need to be involved in the campaigns, while the youth whether in or out of schools should be encouraged and supported to form local associations in which way they will see the fight more as their own than that of the UNICEF or other donor organizations.
Mai Tangle, (emir of Billiri) Dr Abdu Buba Maisheru 11 said when people are trained on how to catch a fish its better because they can always use the method to catch on their own because they know how to do it. He stressed that the fight against HIV/AIDS particularly among out of school youth (OSY) is a very significant effort.
The emir craved for the continued replication of the effort within and outside the state until the disease becomes history in the continent of Africa and beyond.