Oxfam's work on HIV and AIDS by country
Oxfam recognises the close links between HIV and AIDS and poverty, and the way in which one increases vulnerability to the other. We have therefore put responding to HIV and AIDS and to the impact they have on people’s lives, high on our list of priorities.
Southern Africa, where the pandemic is hitting hardest, is where we do the majority of our HIV and AIDS work, but we are also working to tackle the disease and its effects in East and Central Africa, South Asia, and East Asia, and we are developing our programmes in all the other regions where we work.
We are approaching this in a variety of ways:
- Adapting our core work so that it responds to the needs of people with HIV and AIDS, or who are in danger of becoming infected (we call this ‘mainstreaming’ HIV and AIDS). For example, we aim to adapt our livelihoods programmes so that they are more productive and less labour intensive, so that HIV positive people, who may have decreased levels of energy, can participate in work. Mainstreaming also extends to our campaigning work and our management practices. All of our work in Southern Africa, the hardest hit region, and in other badly affected regions such as East Africa, is being mainstreamed. For example:
In Malawi we are:
• Exploring new agricultural techniques and tools to make good nutrition more easily available for people.
• Lobbying the government to put laws in place to protect widows from being thrown off their property.
In Zambia we:
• Have been ensuring that people living with HIV and AIDS are receiving the food, water, and hygiene help that they needed during the recent food crisis which hit the whole region.
• Will be helping people – especially those living with HIV and AIDS – to build up their ability to earn a living and get access to food in highly disaster-prone areas.
In Angola we:
• Plan to help people minimise the risk of transmitting HIV and AIDS, and the impact that they have on their lives, by ensuring that they have access to good information and health services.
In Tanzania and Burundi we:
• have committed to providing seed funds to all partners on HIV and AIDS work.
- Focusing directly on the disease, its causes, and effects; raising peoples’ awareness about how it spreads and how to reduce the risk of infection, helping people get access to treatment and care if they are already infected (including campaigning for fairer prices for medicines), and working to reduce discrimination against infected people and their families. Much of our work in Southern and East Africa, as well as East and South Asia, falls into this category. For example:
In Malawi we are:
• Training local drama groups to educate people in reasons for the spread of HIV and the importance of supporting those who are affected by it, whether they are widowed or orphaned.
• Training traditional healers and ‘initiators’ in recognising practices that spread the virus, and advising young people on what kinds of behaviour increase the risk of infection.
• Lobbying and working with the government to ensure that there is an adequate health service so that everyone who wants to can be tested, and everyone who needs to can be treated.
In Zambia we are:
• Planning to help communities to strengthen their social safety nets to ensure that people already living in a highly disaster prone area and vulnerable to HIV and AIDS have something to fall back on, for example, home-based care for the sick.
In Mozambique we are:
• Supporting local organisations to lobby the government for good basic services, such as education and health care, which will help to improve people’s understanding of and access to testing and treatment for HIV and AIDS.
• Planning to strengthen the existing health service structure and community support networks to help them become more effective in preventing the spread of HIV, to help people receive treatment and be cared for and treated without discrimination.
In India we are:
• Supporting tribal adolescents to encourage the government to meet their health and education needs so that they have a better understanding of HIV and AIDS and other STDs and how to reduce the risk of infection, as well as access to better treatment and care for those already infected.
• Ensuring that HIV and AIDS awareness and response is a high priority in Tsunami-hit areas.
In Thailand and the surrounding region we are:
• Working with migrants who are vulnerable to the infection. Thailand has over two million migrants, from countries such as Burma, Cambodia and Laos. Oxfam is supporting the work of a local partner, the Raks Thai Foundation, in promoting better access to treatment, reducing infection and improving the quality of support and care for people and their families living with HIV and AIDS.
At a global level:
• Oxfam’s Make Trade Fair campaign aims to stop international trade rules restricting access to medicines in poor countries. Oxfam continues to lobby for the Global Fund to provide adequate and effective funding to fight HIV and AIDS, TB and malaria across the international community.
- Ensuring we understand HIV and AIDS so that we can help ourselves and others: we have introduced an HIV and AIDS workplace programme that includes training, opportunities for discussions and questions, and treatment for those who may have become infected. Raising our own awareness of HIV and AIDS, how we can live positively if infected, and the wider implications of HIV and AIDS for ourselves and our families, helps us to cope and also to help other organisations and communities to strengthen their ability to cope with the impacts of HIV and AIDS.
