KENYA: Voluntary Counselling Testing Centes Set Up By Government For Hiv/Aids. Celebration Of Life Concert By Kool And The Gang

Record ID: 362684

  • Title: KENYA: Voluntary Counselling Testing Centes Set Up By Government For Hiv/Aids. Celebration Of Life Concert By Kool And The Gang
  • Date: 20th November 2002
  • Summary: (L!1) NAIROBI, KENYA (RECENT) (REUTERS) VARIOUS: OF MERCY JAVAN READING A PAMPHLET AT THE COUNSELLING CENTRE. (3 SHOTS) MV: PEOPLE WAITING AT THE CENTRE'S RECEPTION AREA. CU: ON MERCY'S FACE. MV: COUNSELLOR CALLING MERCY FOR HER TEST. MV: MERCY AND COUNSELLOR COMING INTO OFFICE. SCU: (SOUNDBITE) (English) MINISTRY OF HEALTH OFFICIAL, Dr. KENNETH CHEBET, SAYING: "There i
  • Embargoed: 5th December 2002 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: NAIROBI, KENYA
  • Country: Kenya
  • Topics: Health
  • Reuters ID: LVACEVQWWSFKD8YEMRLHB6U4VZXZ
  • Story Text: 85% of Kenyans are HIV negative - what better reason to celebrate? A big concert featuring Kool and the Gang in Nairobi had thousands of Kenyans celebrating life - and safe sex ...
    Mercy has been dreading this day for many weeks now.
    She is 27 years old and like many other Kenyans, she has never had an HIV test.
    Today she has a date with her local Voluntary Counselling and Testing Centre (VTC) to find out once and for all.
    The Kenyan government established VCT centres after AIDS was declared a national disaster last year. More than one and a half million Kenyans have already died of AIDS.
    A lot of people here would still rather not know their status -- and Mercy wonders whether she has made the right decision.
    "There is a lot of anxiety when they come in," explains Dr. Kenneth Chebet, of Kenya's Ministry of Health, "because people don't know what they are going to be given. It's like somebody going to appear before a magistrate, a judge -- you don't know whether you are going to be sentenced to death."
    For this reason, every test comes with a session by trained counsellors.
    Mercy is still nervous as she talks to her counsellor, answering questions about the disease, her lifestyle and her decision to get tested: "My concern is to know my status and to take good control of myself if am negative," says Mercy to her counsellor. "If am positive I guess I'll just have to leave positively."
    After about 15 minutes, she is ready for her test. A new testing method is used, which is accurate and fast.
    Mercy gives two drops of her blood to be tested -- and then she has ten minutes to wait. If there are two lines on the tester, she is positive.
    She looks at the tester and confirms that there is only a single line. Her relief is palpable. "I was just checking, every time I keep on peeping," she said afterwards. "I check if the second line would appear that would mean that I am positive but it didn't after fifteen minutes. It's a good feeling I am telling you."
    Then she has another session with the counsellor, who gives her tips on how to maintain her negative status.
    Mercy is one of few who have already braved the HIV test.
    But with the aggressive media campaigns carried out by the VCT centres, more and more people are following suit.
    "We are saying this is just a disease like any other,"
    says Dr. Kenneth Chebet. "Apparently almost close to ninety percent of Kenyans are negative, so we are telling them: the majority of you are negative, please come ahead -- and even those of you who are positive, we have hope for them."
    Popular local artists have also helped to spread the message of testing.
    For the American based group "Africans Unite Against Aids Globally", the fact that most Kenyans are negative is something to celebrate.
    So they organised a big "Celebrate Life" concert. It featured various Kenyan artists -- and the US group Kool and the Gang, who came to the concert with a clear message: "We hope that by being here, that the community here would at least go get tested to see if they have Aids." said the band's leader, Robert Kool Bell. "And also, if they have to make love, please use a condom."
    "We are saying know your status and do something about your status," adds Rauf Tiahmo, who organised the concert.
    "Eat the right foods, do the right thing and celebrate life.
    Stand up and celebrate life."
    Kool and the Gang have been performing for 30 years -- and their show in Kenya was huge hit.
    Not only that. After the concert, everyone had a lot to say about HIV and AIDS: "Yeah! Very many people are dying, just because they can't abstain from sex," said a young girl. "I mean, like this is something you can avoid, I mean you can stay longer, you can live longer -- cause all you have to do is protect yourself."
    "These gentlemen you see here, they are the same gentlemen who will go back to their villages and they do anything in their villages with woman and whatever!" said one gentleman.
    "So you get Aids in the rural places. Don't talk about Nairobi, Nairobi everybody knows about HIV or something."
    And Mercy wasn't going to miss out on the concert for anything in the world. "I've been here the whole day," says.
    "I just came here because there is nothing as good as to know that you are negative, and that you have protected yourself.
    All throughout."
    More still needs to be done. There are only about eighty VCT centres in Kenya, most in or around urban areas not enough to meet the growing demand.
    To help out, containers with testing facilities are being sent to rural areas, in the hope that more Kenyans will pluck up the courage to get themselves tested.
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