Accra, Aug. 15, GNA - The Peoples Dialogue on Human Settlements, a non-governmental organization, on Tuesday launched a community door-to-door education campaign on HIV/AIDS.

The campaign is aimed at divulging information on HIV/AIDS to people, especially those in less endowed communities, in their own language and environment through a familiar medium of communication, according to Dr Lukman Abdul-Rahim, coordinator of the project. He said both male and female condoms would be distributed freely as a means of encouraging people to patronage them, and demystify local tales on their usage.

Speaking to Ghana News Agency in an interview in Accra, Dr Abdul-Rahim explained that the project was envisaged with the support of the American Jewish World Service (AJWS) as a "Community-Led Response to HIV/AIDS," through care, campaign and economic empowerment. He said through the initiative, 20 community activists from Ashaiman and Old Fadama in the Greater Accra region had been trained to help implement the door-to-door campaign to create community awareness, reduce stigmatisation and discrimination against People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA).

"Economic empowerment of people would only be meaningful if it's propelled on the wheels of adequate information on the pandemic, and healthy lifestyle of PLWHA and their dependants," he held. He appealed to policy makers and opinion leaders to inculcate HIV/AIDS education in all their programmes, adding that the people were being trained as pacesetters to lead their communities in the fight against the disease and improve their living conditions. As part of their training, representatives of targeted communities were taken through an overview of the HIV/AIDS situation in Ghana, including the first official report of the disease in 1986, five years after it generally broke out in 1981. Other topics discussed were: basic facts about Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs); risky behaviours and attitudes and behavioural change methodologies, attitudes towards PLWHAs, the danger of stigmatisation and discrimination.

At least 5,000 condoms had been distributed to targeted communities in the Accra area, as part of the campaign.