Abstracts Vol. 1 [International Conference on AIDS (11th: 1996: Vancouver, Canada)]

Tu.D.2794 - Tu.D.2799

Tuesday July 9, 1996

Results: In 1995 a pilot course with 10 TV programs was developed in order to motivate
the teachers, provoking impact on 22.000 participating teachers, as well as on the audience,
whose reply and interest was perceived by several questions made by them on telephone.
In March of 1996 80,000 teachers will be receiving the training course to reach 2 million 13
to 19 year old students from 200,000 schools.
Lessons Learned: Teachers are inclined to cooperate for the development of AIDS/STD
school programs, once the program is not only a challenge, but also compensatory, because
an opportunity to learn, talk about sexuality drugs and sexual health and establishing a
straight debate about these subjects is being given to students.
Inocnciia Parizzi Negra io, Ministerio da Saude, Bloco G, sobreloja, sala 100 - Brasilia, Brazil -
70.058-900Tel.: [phone] Fax:[phone]
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STRATEGIES TO INVOLVE NEWLY-ARRIVED IMMIGRANT PARENTS IN HIV
EDUCATION.
Baker, Claudia*, Rich, Ruth*,Wulf, Kathleen**. Los Angeles Unified School District, Los
Angeles, CA, USA; * * os Angeles Unified School District, Los Angeles, CA, USA;
*"University of Southern California, University Park, CA, USA.
Issue: While Los Angeles is one of the world wide centers of HIV infection, with more than
I 1,000 cases in Los Angeles County alone, the area nevertheless is representative of large
urban school districts across the United States in terms of its recent immigration of families
from many language and cultural groups.This paper addresses a solution to the difficulty of
educating these historically under served parents about HIV and, equally important, educating them to the need for in-school instruction regarding HIV for their children.
Project: The HIV/AIDS Prevention Project, funded by the Centers for Disease Control, in
the Los Angeles Unified School District serves students in grades 6 through 12. In order to
provide education for the parents, many of whom do not read, write, or understand English,
and to seek their support for HIV education for students, the Project offers presentations in
a vriety of the home languages. Parents see a video entitled "Not My Child" which
addresse standards of behavior from the students points of view, and then the parents
participate in discussions with their peers and a facilitator.They receive informative handouts in their language, plus a resource guide to community health service agencies.
Results: After these first two pilot test years of the program for parents of middle-school
and high school students, evaluation by the parent participants has been highly positive,
expressing appreciation for the information about HIV for themselves as well as for their
children.
Lessons Learned: The most serious barrier to implementation of the project has been
attracting parents to the meetings. Solutions include: I) local on-site planning with strong
community involvement, including churches and county health providers. 2) a variety of culturally- sensitive presenters in the parents' language. 3) flexibility in scheduling to accommodate parents e.g., evenings, and 4) providing a series of meetings, i.e., more than one to offer
consistent support.
Claudia Baker, Los Angeles Unified School District 1 320 W.Third St. Room 54 Los Angeles,
CA 90017 Telephone: [phone] Fax: [phone]
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CHALLENGES, CONSTRAINTS AND SOLUTIONS IN THE PROCESS OF HIV/AIDS
AND SEX EDUCATION IN SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES IN TAMILNADU, INDIA
Suniti Solomon. Bronwyn Leece, GeetaYrg Care
The Challenge & The Constraints:The steep drop in the age of persons with evidence of
HIV infection, 1 I C 5years,prompted YRG CARE to initiate a School/college education programme on sex, sexuality HIV and other STIs to enable the students to act responsibly and
reduce the acquisition and transmission of the HIV and other STIs. HIV education programmes in schools and colleges were initially discouraged on the grounds, among others,
that (a) HIV is not an Indian problem (b) it was found in India only among sex workers and
truck drivers (c) the adolescents and young adults participating in the sessions would be
prompted to seek sexual relief.
The Solution:To access schools and colleges, this Centre launched a top-down approach
which involved (i) seminars for policy makers (ii) seminars for teaching faculty and (iii) seminars for Parent teachers associations.The Centre developed a structured module, the first
in India, which contains an audio -visual programme on basic facts for a joint student-teacher
audience and thereafter- small group discussions, for students, facilitated by trained social
workers, on human anatomy/physiology prevention and values/attitudes and beliefs.
The Results:YRC CARE gratefully acknowledges the strength of word-of mouth and personal networkinrg that has created support and demand for its programme. 91 schools and
52 colleges (total students 10100) have been impacted of whom 65 are active peer educators for the Centre. Building on the lessons learnt from these programmes, the Centre has
began state- wide CBO training programs on school education and published answers to
120 questions frequently asked by students during the programme. 3000 students participated in the candle light marches on Dec I, 1994 "World AIDS Day" and on Sep I, 1995
"Teacher's Day" This proiect is the first on sexuality education in the country by an
NGO/CBO.
Suniti Solomon, tDirector,YR Gaitonde Centre for AIDS Research and Education, I Raman
Street, T Nag a Madras 6000 7, Inda
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ADOLESCENT INDIAN YOUTH, SEXUALITY AND NEED TO ENHANCE THE STD
RELATED INFORMATION IN AIDS PREVENTION PROGRAMMES
Sengupta Sushma.*, Chaturvedi P*, Shastri S*. Drishtikon. Delhi India.
The stud was prompted by a chance finding when after an intervention, 3 out of 8 male
students between the ges tam Io 6 I 9 yrs who opted for testing were found to be strongly pos tivo for- mixod TD3 rnfetosThe free sexual services wore provided by the housewives icr conventronil residential areas who were apparently +ive for STDs.
Objecives:(r) To assess the idoloscnt's perceptron of AIDS threat and risk behaviour (ii) To
asse the tird in adolescent sexuality in urban youth. (iii)To assess the level of awareness
or DIV AIDS/STs. (v)Lao demosItrate the need to provde information on STD infections
is i potentiaI is i fictor in DIV ti-ansmrssr an.

Methodology: The data is based on a sample study of 402 students from 4 Delhi-based
colleges through interviews and questionnaires (Study is targeted at interviewing I000
more students which is expected to be completed by April 1996.)
Results: (I) 88% students perceive AIDS threat as real in India (2) 32% males (M) and 67%
females (F) think, the sexual activity is common amongst students (3) 55% M and 68% F
consider heterosexual encounters are a greater risk than homosexual ones for -HIV transmission (4) 55% M and 45% F did not know the full form of acronym STD; ',5) 68% of
both the sexes were unaware or STD's link with AIDS; (6) 79% M and 82% F did not have
a clear concept of STD symptoms.
Conclusion: (I)/A noteworthy percentage of adolescent youth is sexually active and is at a
potential risk of contracting STD and HIV infections (2)Though the awareness level on
AIDS issues is fair; there is a severe lack of information of STDs and their link with AIDS (3)
It is imperative therefore to integrate the STD related information with all the interventions, targeted at adolescent youth to prevent AIDS in India.
Sushma Sengupta, Drishtikon, 1207 DI Vasant Kunj New Delhi I 10070 India.Tel: 91 I
6132483, 6892258 Fax: 9 I-I -6896454, 9 I-I 1-3755115
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LESSONS LEARNT IN FIVE YEARS NATIONAL HIV PREVENTION STRATEGY IN
SCHOOLS:THE ITALIAN EXPERIENCE.
L. Bertinato*, S. PoliA, M. Mirandola', D. Greco"', I. Serafin. *National Agency for Regional
Health Care Services; **Ministry of Education; Infect. Diseases Inst., Univ ofVerona;
"National Institute of Health; ^ Ministry of Health, Rome, Italy
Background: The majority of HIV infection in Italy occurs between the ages of 15 and 24.
Students are identified by the National AIDS Commission as an important target for prevention strategies. In Italy all Health Education activities in schools must be approved by the
Ministry of Education (MOE).The school principals, parents and teachers often oppose the
introduction of sex, AIDS and drug education in the curriculum for cultural or religious reasons.
Objective: Reduction of the incidence of HIV infection by means of AIDS Education in
schools.
Strategy:1990 Creation of the National HIVTraining Program (NHP) at the Nationa
Health Institute sponsored by the Ministry of Health (MOH)
1991 Specific training courses for the 95 local school health education officers in the fiamework of the NH'
1992 Development of school Guidelines for HIV prevention as a result of a joint work
group MOE + MOH and distributed to all Italian schools, on the basis of the conclusions of
the courses.
1992 -To present. Two national AIDS prevention campaigns have been dedicated to young
people throught the training of their educators: the 4,000 high school principals (evaluation
done) and the 4,000 school health teachers (evaluation still in progress). Specific educational material has also been developed.
1994 A European Seminar was organised in Rome with the support of EC, allowing Italian
health educators, teachers and a group of students to compare their progaras with
European equivalents.
1995 The creation of a monthly magazine for students publshed by MOE wth contribu
tions from MOH in 300,000 copies, which includes the prevention projects
Conclusions: Collaboration among officials of MOH and MOE was crucial in the development of the national strategy, increasing AIDS preventon activities at talian schools (78/o of
the principals have reported prevention activities) and in re duc ng source n of opposition.
Communication has been identified as an important instrument of preventon in schools.
This strategy can be used in other countries with similar cultural and religious barriers.
L. Bertinato, ASSR, Piazza G. Marconi 25. 00144 Rome, ItalyTel.: [phone] Fax: +39
6-54951488
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P.WA.S.ASTEACHERS IN SCHOOL AIDS EDUCATION:AN ITALIAN EXPERIENCE
G. Gaetani, M.C. Rovati, F. Silvola*, R. Lippi*, A. Genolao, G. Prestinio, G. Barbarini. Division of
Infectious and Tropical Diseases I.R.C.C.S. S. Matteo, University of Pavia;* ADDEPOSOrganazation L.J. Engelmajer; Municipality ofVoghera (Pavia) Italy
Objective:To verify if the involvment of PWA.s. may be one of the most important keys of
the educational programs on AIDS in Schools.
Methods:We together (Infectivologists. Psychologists and AIDS patients) conducted an educational attempt on high school students in the town ofVoghera (Northern Italy).We
administered a questionnaire to a group of 500 students (340 Males and 160 Females)
before and after a series of lessons taught by doctors and PW.A.s. together:The questionnaires were previously prepared by psychologists
Results: After the lessons there was a significant better- knowledge of HIV transmission way
and of the effectiveness of serological test to check the contagion. A very significant differ
ence was in the Lefore/after answer to this question: "it's possible, and in what way to recognize HIV positive patients?".We didn't reveal significant differences in othe' -basic knowl
edges.
Discussion: Our ixperence demonstrated that the ino vement of PW.A.s. in AIDS educa
tion is a very intecesting strategy that needs to be exploited fully cn al nacmaunr no warlIdwide.We think that probably the significant difference we revealed between before and
after answers lies in the presence of PWA.s.We believe also that next lessons must concern the educative aspects more than the specifcally emotional ones.
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IMPACT OF HIV COUNSELOR'S EDUCATION FOR STUDENTS ON THEIR
ATTITUDE TOWARD HIV INFECTION AND AIDS IN JAPAN
YanagaYuriko, Shirahata A. University of Occupational & Environmental Health, Kitaflyushu,
Japani
Objective: T S ealuate the impact of AIDS education gen by a coueor- spec ized
DIV infection and AIDS an she attitude of asdolescents toward DIV infect onAIDS in westem part of Japan where HIV infection through sexual transmission remains rare.
Methods: A total of 883 Japanese public hgh schlo studes aye ne o5 0 18 yeAris
old: male: female -3:7) who sad received yearly lensures or DIV nfection and AIDS by

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