World Cup AIDS Initiative

The Swazi Observer
by James Hall

By now readers are aware that next month’s FIFA World Cup in neighbouring South Africa is much more than soccer. It is about promoting Southern Africa in a positive manner, for future tourism and investment, and about grasping the once in a lifetime opportunity to build new facilities from sporting to roads. It is also an opportunity to promote public health. A tie-in to the World Cup generates immediate interest for any project, and this week an AIDS awareness initiative was launched called Africa Goal 2010.

According to the Southern Africa HIV and AIDS Information Dissemination Service (SAfAIDS), “The project will harnesses the potential of the FIFA World Cup as a platform for HIV Information Dissemination.” It was launched in Zimbabwe a few days ago. According to SAfAIDS, crowds gathered to watch World Cup matches will come in contact with health information. By screening live World Cup matches on a large screen in rural areas throughout the Eastern and Southern African region, an area heavily affected by AIDS, and combining this with the dissemination of HIV information, Africa Goal aims to share behaviour change information with traditionally "hard to reach" groups in an effective and memorable way,” said a SAfAIDS spokeswoman.

The Africa Goal project was begun four years ago, during the 2006 World Cup. A team of nine volunteers travelled from Kenya to Namibia and back, projecting soccer matches and disseminating HIV information to remote communities. It worked well, and is happening again, starting soon. This year’s African Goal Team is made up of 10 members. During the dates of the 2010 Soccer Showcase the team plans to travel through Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique before arriving in Swaziland before the team’s final destination of South Africa.

At this week’s launch, partnering parties included youth groups, business leaders, diplomats, media practitioners and representatives of AIDS service organisations. They met at the National Gallery in Harare to witness the project launch and exhibition, which featured images of hand-made footballs designed by children throughout the continent, as well as images from the 2006 Africa Goal campaign. Both the exhibition and the project were received with much enthusiasm. In her remarks at the launch, the Ambassador of Canada to Zimbabwe, Barbara Richardson, committed her country to supporting the Africa Goal project.

The government of Canada is one of the major supporters of the Africa Goal Project, together with PSI Zimbabwe and SAfAIDS, among others. It was a major week for Canadian support of AIDS initiative in Africa. At the weekend, the Toronto-based Stephen Lewis Foundation, whose motto is “Turning the Tide of HIVand AIDS in Africa,” hosted along with its Swaziland partner SWAPOL the continent’s first conference devoted to African grandmothers and AIDS, which was the subject of last week’s AIDS LIFELINE column.”

The Africa Goal project will follow the AIDS Highway through eastern and southern Africa, where increased mobility and migration in conjunction with rising disposable incomes and the associated escalation of “transactional sex” (commercial sex, usually involving transportation drivers, migrant workers and other mobile people) along this central transport and trade route have been a major contributor to the spread of HIV in the region.

Soccer has long been followed with excitement in the continent and no other sport has the capacity to draw crowds and attention the way soccer does. Organisers of African Goal have noted that the largest sector of soccer supporters, the 15 to 49 age-group is also the most vulnerable when it comes to HIV. It is for this reason that the Africa Goal team sees the opportunity of reaching this group through the Soccer showcase. SAfAIDS Country Representative to Zimbabwe Monica Mandiki said her organisation would be providing the publications and information to be dispensed at the World Cup game screenings. “We see the Africa Goal project partnership as a way to reach ‘at risk groups,’ which are traditionally hard to reach, with vital HIV prevention information,” said Mandiki.

Africa Goal 2010 will start in Nairobi in June and end in Johannesburg in July. AIDS LIFELINE has sought information from organisers about when and where the Africa Goal team will screen in Swaziland, and will pass on this information to readers as soon as it is available.

http://www.observer.org.sz/index.php?news=13276