Health

The Health Committee supports two projects at Mutare. Home Based Care and the Teen HIV Prevention Programme (peer education for youths about sexuality and HIV).

De projects are developed locally en are executed and supported by local people.

The Health Committee also wants to learn from experiences from Mutare. Peer education can also be used in the Netherlands to reach groups of young people.

Flinty’s a youth centre at Haarlem, works together with the peer educators from Mutare. The last two years at World Aids Day activities have been organised. Youths from Mutare, who visited Haarlem at that time, help to organise the activities. The profits of the activities are used for support of the peer educators at Mutare.

In cooperation with ICCO&Kerk in Actie (Inter church organisation for development co-operation) and PSO, Maeva Bonjour was send as a Young Professional to Mutare from July 2007 to March 2008 to support the Health Care Projects. She supported the build up of the organisation of the peer educators and the improvement of their activities. She looked at the needs of the Home Based Care project and ways to improve the provisions for the caregivers. With the Mutare Health Department and Africa University Health Department she discussed the possibilities and needs for research. With research and improved data collection the needs of patients at Mutare could be better surfed. A start was made with computer training at Africa University for some of the staff of Mutare Health Department.

During her work at Mutare a trainee, David Manyakaidze was working alongside Maeva. When she left he has taken over part of her activities.

In the coming years we remain to support the projects at Mutare through dispatching and trainings in cooperation with ICC&Kerk in Actie (Inter church organisation for development co-operation), Impulsis, Togetthere and the Red Cross Haarlem and environs we remain supportive of the Health sector at Mutare.

World Aids Day, 1 December 2007

Students from the Coornhert Lyceum Haarlem and several Mutarese colleges participated in a writing competition for World Aids Day.
Here follows the winning contributions from Mutare and Haarlem.

It will come at your door knocking

As I pass the graveyard grieving, over
My weak uncle dying, my mother crying
Is the memory that comes to me crawling
Woken from the grave reverie, I hear “you are lying”
Two lads disagreeing whether AIDS is killing

Without invitation I interject, “what”. People are striving
Trying to eradicate this scourge that is traumatising
Though you might resort to mocking remember that,
The calling will one day come at your door knocking.

Rebecca Chopwanya
Herentals College Mutare

My Pledge
I will look up events related to World AIDS Day in my area and try to visit them. It really is a shame that a disease like AIDS is still out there killing while we have plenty of medicines. AIDS isn't a major problem here and shouldn't be one anywhere else in the world either.

My Report
On 1 December it will be World Aids Day. The goal of this day is to set a further step in the fight to stop AIDS. The pledge asks people from all over the world to take the lead to stop AIDS. These pledges will be collected online, by mail and at events, and they will be used to create exhibitions, banners and other usability acts during major events in 2008. All these efforts will result in more AIDS prevention in three areas: treatment, care and support.

Saskia Schoonebeek
Coornhert Lyceum Haarlem