The Kaneshie District Minister of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana, the Rev Dr Isaac K. Fokuo, has called on church leaders to identify virgins in their respective churches on order to effectively groom and protect them against the risk of the HIV/AIDS menace. He said that when identified, the virgins could be organised for special programmes exposing them to the actual dangers of the disease.

Rev Fokuo made the call when he launched an HIV/AIDS educational campaign for the Young People?s Guild (YPG) in the Kaneshie District last weekend in Accra. He noted that with the creation of many virgins? groups throughout the country, the current rate of spread of the disease would be reduced since proper check could be done on such groups.

The District Minister said that plans were afoot to form the group in all 19 local churches of his district. He, however, encouraged people who had lost their virginity not to be worried but to maintain a secondary virginity to save them from being infected by the disease. Calling on all virgins to be proud of how far they had come without sexual intercourse, he asked them to join the group.

The President of the Kaneshie Local Presbyterian Church YPG, Mr Eugene Amoah, explained that the campaign was to create awareness of the disease and its detrimental effect in members and the general public. He said that HIV/AIDS programmes had been incorporated into the Guild?s activities to ensure that members were constantly reminded of the scourge and the need to abstain from premarital sex.