Assisting people living with HIV / AIDS
Ukraine remains the leader in Europe in terms of HIV infection spread. UNAIDS experts estimate that up to 250000 people in Ukraine live with HIV, and only every second knows their diagnosis. The regions most affected by HIV are Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa, Donetsk, Kyiv and Mykolaiv, as well Kyiv city. (Information is provided without taking into account the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol, which do not provide data on epidemic statistics since April 2014. There are also no data on some areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, since summer 2014 data from these regions has been not received fully.
«Odesa Center for Social and Psychological Assistance to HIV-Infected People» has been operating for people with HIV / AIDS since 2009 in Odesa city.
The center is providing comprehensive assistance to families with children born to HIV-infected parents:
- Support, self-control skills, conscious HIV treatment, tuberculosis, sexually transmitted infections
- Motivation for treatment with antiretroviral therapy (ART)
- Improvement of health state, reduction of mortality rate.
- Work to increase the level of knowledge and awareness of families affected by HIV / AIDS, on psychological, legal and social issues, to overcome internal and external stigma and social adaptation
Odessa Regional AIDS Center provides on-call duty and counseling on all aspects of living with HIV: assistance in receiving and transmitting ART, diagnosis assistance. Also there is a Community Center where HIV-infected people and their close surroundings turn out, where everyone receives support, can socialize with social workers, a psychologist, view thematic movies, or relax in friendly atmosphere.
Parallel work is being conducted on training volunteers to work with children and adolescents “of risk group”, conducting methodological consultations in the field of HIV / AIDS for students of pedagogical schools necessary for them to conduct lessons, extracurricular activities and actions devoted to healthy lifestyle and aimed at bringing up schoolchildren.
