Brasil gets the safe sex message
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country page | Millennium
Development Goal 6: HIV, AIDS, malaria...
Image courtesy of Brazil government
A DFID-supported volunteer organisation is helping a local government group
to spread the message about safe sex in Brazil's north-eastern Amazonas state.
Government officials in the town of Manacapuru in the Amazonas set up the
Princesinha project in 1998, to reduce the spread of HIV and other sexually
transmitted infections. In common with other states in Brazil - across the
country more than ten million people are infected - the Amazonas face an HIV
endemic with women and poor people most at risk.
And the endemic is striking hard in the semi-arid Amazonas - where drought
and food shortages have exacerbated the region's deep-seated poverty and social
inequality.
Addressing high-risk behaviour
The Princisinha project works closely with International Service - which
receives DFID funding - to get the safe-sex message across and to address the
stigma attached to these infections and increase understanding of the needs of
those living with HIV and AIDS.
It uses a mix of educational activities and humour to reach vulnerable
groups, including sex workers and men who have sex with men.
Most of the project's work is concentrated in the areas where high-risk
behaviour and macho attitudes are most prevalent - in the bars, clubs and port
area and in the red light districts. Armed with latex penises, condoms and graphic pictures of advanced states of
venereal diseases, project workers use humour and sketches to reinforce the safe
sex message.
International Service provides the services of a nurse, who works with the
project to strengthen technical knowledge. The project also distributes condoms
to all target groups and provides access to clinical examinations.
This approach is clearly working - demand for the free condoms is
outstripping supply, and female condoms are especially popular. Generic drugs
are also being manufactured, to challenge the monopolies of the pharmaceutical
industry.
Key facts
- Given Brazil’s middle-income status, DFID works mainly as a regional
donor. We facilitate access to
international best practice, promote lesson-learning and work to empower poor and
disadvantaged groups
- International Service is an international development organisation working
with local groups in Latin America, West Africa and the Middle East to help
reduce poverty and repression
- DFID provided £4.58million over 2001-05 through the Programme
Partnership Agreement with International Service
- International Service is also
working in Burkina Faso to help women from some of the country's poorest
communities set up their own businesses.
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