Youth learn new HIV/AIDS Peer Education skills

Close to 30 young people from secondary schools across the country are now better equipped with the communication skills needed to help their peers make better choices about sex.

Through the Caribbean Family Planning Association (CFPA) and the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) the teenaged participants were engaged in workshop from April 18 to 21 at the Anglican Pastoral Centre under the “Fighting Aids Through Training and Education” (FATE) project. {{more}}

Kingsley Duncan of the local Planned Parenthood Association noted that youths were the ones most at risk of contracting HIV/AIDS hence the need for the intervention.

He expounded, “They are the nation’s human resource and they will become the leaders and professionals in the next decade. If they are at risk and are not protected, then everything that their parents and the government have invested will go to waste.”

Duncan noted that with young people also having some of the highest incidences of unplanned pregnancies, the training workshop would empower them to reach out to other peers who may be engaging in risky sexual activities.

The Planned Parenthood representative also stressed that it was essential to empower the peer educators with the correct information so that they could share their knowledge with others.

Some of the resource persons at the four-day workshop included Jasmine Creese from the Curriculum Department in the Ministry of Education, Nurse Abna Richards and Laverne Stephens of the Planned Parenthood Association.