HIV/AIDS in school curriculum commendable

Begoro, Aug. 10, GNA - The Fanteakwa District Focal Person for People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHAS), Alhaji Seidu Abanga, has observed that the integration of HIV/AIDS in the school curriculum was the ideal means to fight the disease through pupils.

Addressing a nine-day workshop on HIV/AIDS for teachers drawn from basic and second cycle schools at Begoro on Monday, Alhaji Abanga urged the GES to make the teaching of HIV/AIDS compulsory in all educational institutions.

He said the time had come to protect the Ghanaian child, who, he described as the "window of hope" for the country from contracting the disease, saying, this feat could only be achieved through the classroom. He asked teachers to make good use of the HIV/AIDS textbooks to teach the pupils.

Alhaji Abanga said even though the HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in the district dropped from 6.8 per cent in 2004 to 4.1 per cent in 2005, the rate was still above the national prevalence rate of 2.7 per cent. He called on the people to adopt proper prevention measures and test their HIV status periodically to further reduce the prevalence rate in the district.

He said even though the national rate was the positive impact of government control programme, there was the likelihood that AIDS orphans would double within the next decade, if measures were not adopted to check infection rate.

Alhaji Abanga asked teachers to get involved in the national strategic framework to help control the infection rate from the school level in the district in particular and the nation in general.