PREVENTIVE AIDS EDUCATION AT
HEART OF UNESCO MESSAGE TO OAU SUMMIT IN ABUJA
Paris, April 26 (No.2001-63) -
UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura highlighted the importance of
preventive education in a message to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU)
African Summit on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Other Related Infectious Diseases
taking place in Abuja (Nigeria), April 26 and 27.
Pointing to the catastrophic
impact of the HIV pandemic on development in Africa, the Director-General -
represented by Nouréini Tidjani-Serpos, Assistant UNESCO Director-General for
Africa who read out the message - warned that “the worst […] is yet to come”.
Mr Matsuura said that UNESCO can best contribute to
curbing AIDS “by taking a lead role in preventive education within the
global framework of the UN system” and stressed that preventive education must
go beyond formal education and develop “non-formal approaches to reach the
unreached and the most vulnerable, and to promote adequate risk management in
relation to HIV/AIDS and drug abuse.”
UNESCO’s preventive education
strategy focuses on the core tasks of: integrating HIV/AIDS preventive education
into the global development agenda and national policies; adapting preventive
education to the diversity of needs and contexts; changing risk behavior and
reducing vulnerability; coping with the impact of HIV/AIDS on national
institutions, notably in the education sector.
“Preventive education is the
best vaccination. […] If done massively, it can turn the tide”, the
Director-General said. UNESCO will co-operate closely with UNAIDS and other
international partners to “combat complacency, challenge stigmatization,
overcome the tyranny of silence, and promote more caring attitudes.”
He further called for the
integration of HIV/AIDS preventive education into the global development agenda
and national policies and declared that “coping with the institutional impacts
of the HIV/AIDS pandemic […] on schools, students, teachers and other key
institutions at the country level will be another priority for UNESCO.”
The Director-General also
stressed that preventive education must be adapted to the diversity of needs and
contexts to be effective and said that UNESCO will “work on enhancing the
quality and effectiveness of preventive education and on developing access to
scientific information on HIV/AIDS provided by basic research.” He promised
that “close attention will be given to disseminating accurate information
about methods of transmission, safe practices” and the use of
counselling services, formal and non-formal education and networks, to reach
students, institutions and communities.
Mr Matsuura highlighted the
need to “encourage the transfer of relevant scientific knowledge and know-how
[…] first of all to Africa” and to “promote scientific co-operation and
strengthen capacities of higher education institutes to produce and disseminate
research and information related to HIV/AIDS.”
The Director-General emphasized
that preventive education must be a concern and responsibility for all,
including people living with HIV/AIDS. In developing preventive education
methods and materials, UNESCO will “seek to combat discrimination against
those living with HIV/AIDS” and “encourage innovative community responses
which empower the most vulnerable and promote respect for human rights in the
context of HIV/AIDS”, including access to treatment and vaccine trials.
In his message, Mr Matsuura
recalled the recent regional ECOWAS conference on HIV/AIDS organized by UNESCO
in co-operation with UNAIDS in Elmina (Ghana), which emphasized that the
continent’s response must be founded on a systematic mobilization of the
education sector.
Saying that the very survival
of some societies was at risk, Mr Matsuura called for mobilization from the
highest level of government and from all ministries, particularly ministries of
finance, health and education. He called for the involvement of all,
particularly in the field of education: policy makers, parents, community
representatives, and persons living with HIV/AIDS. “Not acting now would be a
moral failure of unprecedented proportions”, he said.
Mr Matsuura characterized
current levels of international aid for the fight against AIDS in Africa as “grossly
inadequate to meet the challenge.” Total bilateral and multilateral assistance
to Africa’s fight against AIDS at the end of 1990s totalled US$70 million per
annum, roughly $3 per HIV infected person. He called for a massive mobilization
commensurate with the challenge.
The Abuja summit, held in
preparation of the United
Nations Special Session on HIV/AIDS (New York, 24-27 June 2001), is hosted by
the government of Nigeria, bringing together the majority of Africa’s heads of
state and government as well as the relevant United Nations organizations,
development banks, non-governmental organizations and the private sector.
Some 36.1 million people are
living with HIV or AIDS world-wide, with 5.3 million newly infected during 2000
alone and 21.8 million deaths since the start of the epidemic. For Africa, the
situation is critical: Sub-Saharan Africa has the largest number of people with
AIDS - some 25.3 million in 2000 - and in several affected countries
life-expectancy is dropping sharply to 35 years.
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