Anchoring Awareness in the Community - Handicap International

ADAPTED AWARENESS METHOD
The choice of this innovative method of raising
awareness by going from house to house was
based on in-depth preliminary studies. In
addition, subjects targeted by the awareness
program were carefully selected. Finally, before
starting the program, a guide giving details on
the messages to be delivered for each subject
was drawn up in order to serve as a basis for
the animators.
Know the context very well to chose
the appropriate awareness method
Before the start of the project, we took the
time to carry out preliminary studies in order
to precisely define needs, elaborate an
appropriate intervention strategy and collect
data enabling us to measure project impact.
These studies concerned the knowledge,
attitudes, practices and behaviors related
to HIV/AIDS and reproductive and sexual
health, an analysis of prevention and
training tools, training needs in the HIV/AIDS
area in health structures and, finally, HIV/TB
(tuberculosis) co-infection in Somaliland.
Thus, the choice of carrying out a “house-tohouse”
awareness program rested on solid
knowledge of the context and was inspired
by recommendations from these studies.
Delimit awareness boundaries
Once the awareness strategy was chosen and
before actually starting the activities, we carried
out extensive work to choose the topics
that would be concerned by the awareness
program. In this way, some subjects related
to HIV were withdrawn for cultural reasons,
because they were not pertinent in the chosen
context or because they were not socially
acceptable.
Once the subjects were chosen, a manual was
put together to precisely define the notions
to be taught and the level of detail required
for each topic.
This manual then served as the basis for all
community awareness activities and for tool
production and communication on HIV/AIDS.
Rely on existing bases
The manual was written at the beginning
of the project in Ethiopia by a project team
committee. For its preparation, group
members chose to use already existing
analyses and documents written by experts on
the subject. To begin with, they were inspired
by Ethiopian specifications for the training
of peer educators on the topic of HIV. After
selecting nine priority awareness topics, the
writing committee turned again to existing
documents, such as communication
supports collected from different stakeholders
in the fight against AIDS, in order to describe
each topic in detail for the manual.
Adapt prevention to the context
To create a training manual for animators
that was adapted to Somaliland, it was
necessary to use the original manual
written in Ethiopia. But for this manual to be
accepted in Somaliland, it was necessary
to withdraw some topics that would not
have been accepted in the country’s cultural
context (promotion of condom use, mentions
of homosexuality, etc.). In addition, so that the
© Julie de Lamarzelle pour Handicap International
15