| News in Detail for August 2008 | Villages in Burundi now celebrate weddings during the daytime From 11 - 22 August, Constellation coaches organised a learning event with facilitators of Health Net TPO and the Health Comitee of Kibuye, in central Burundi. They conducted six community visits in the district of Kibuye. Six villages already took action to reduce their vulnerabilities. For example, they now celebrate weddings during the daytime to reduce the risk linked with night time celebrations," explained Patience from the Burundi's Alliance against AIDS and Constellation coach.
"We learned a lot from the experience of the Health Comitee in Murenda, Bungere and Makebuko regarding inclusion of People Living with HIV (PLHIV)," shared the Chair of the Health Comitee in Gisikara after a SALT visit. In many villages, PLHIV do not open up about their HIV status. Thus, community animators in these villages conducted home visits to discuss about HIV with the families. This helped PLHIV to break the silence. One PLHIV said: "I regret I spend all this time hiding." During the home visits the community animators also referred people to the testing centre. One PLHIV shared that "I used to go to the traditional healer. I regret that I wasted so much money as it did not heal me." In Murenda, 647 people did an HIV test within the last 7 months, proudly announced the members of the health Comitee and the community animators! In Buhinda where the Health Comitee opened a testing center last December, 436 people did their HIV test. During the SALT visits in November 2007, villages identified their vulnerabilities to HIV -parties at night, sexual violence, alcohol or remarriage of widows with a polygamous man-. Communities discussed how they could by-pass their tradition. In some villages, community members involved religious leaders to address the issue of parties in the evening time and decided to celebrate weddings during the daytime. Administrators have been involved to address the issue of remarriage. Sometimes widows remarry or cohabitate with a polygamous man, which increases the risk of HIV transmission to other family members. Administrators now try to control these illegal practices. Facilitators made giant leaps forward during the learning event because they learned from each others responses. Once again, we see that every community is an expert in it own situation. People find their own unique solutions. Facilitators made action plans integrating the lessons learned. They will continue to visit each other to exchange. They will do the self-assessment again every 6 months as well as SALT visits. "We now really see who we are and what we contribute in this common fight in our communities. I didn't know that we had good practices that we could share with others." Marie Nshirimana, community animator in Murenda. |
Six communities took action since November 2007 when the AIDS Competence Process was introduced. Facilitators met again from 11-22 August to share ideas, lessons learned and to facilitate the process with support of Constellation coaches.