Temwa - Sustainable Community Development, Malawi - Funding for Mobile VCT Testing Received

Tuesday, 16 December 2008 17:53

plwa-group Temwa has recently secured funding from the T.J. Meyer Family Foundation for several HIV and AIDS projects, to be implemented during 2009. This includes providing mobile voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) clinics to a minimum of 200 individuals in 10 locations across Usisya over a period of ten months. Currently, approximately 11,000 people live over an hour's walk from the only VCT clinic in Usisya, with some people living up to nine hours away. Mobile VCT clinics are something Temwa has been asked to provide by communities in Usisya and we are happy to now be in a position to deliver.

Temwa will also establish three local support groups for people living with HIV and AIDS (PLWA). Before 2007, no-one in Usisya lived openly with the disease, but since then a combination of factors - including support from Temwa - has resulted in the first PLWA support group being established. This group meets regularly to discuss issues facing them as HIV-positive people, to receive various training, and to support one another physically and emotionally. However, as there are many people who cannot travel the distances necessary to attend this group, new PLWA groups will be set up in the North, South and West of Usisya to allow for greater participation and support for affected people in the region.