HIVAN/South Coast Hospice HIV/AIDS Forum Series

On the 24 April 2006, HIVAN in association with the South Coast Hospice, launched the HIV/AIDS Community Forum Series. This is a quarterly forum with the aim to enhance, network, collaborate and share information amongst various organizations involved in HIV/AIDS activities.

At the launch, Professor Hoosen (Jerry) Coovadia, Victor Daitz Chair of HIV/AIDS Research at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, spoke about why HIV/AIDS is increasing in Africa, especially Sub-Saharan African, even though there are many prevention programmes in place. He noted that HIV/AIDS is the worst pandemic the world has ever seen and that it affects all people and disciplines; it is not simply confined to biomedical science as some diseases have been defined in the past. Prof Coovadia talked about the effect of having multiple and/or concurrent partners. He also emphasized that HIV/AIDS affected women more than men in this part of the world, and that women and children are more vulnerable to contracting HIV due to a number of factors, not least of all their relative economic powerlessness and the violence that many women experience during sex (referring to the high rape rate in SA). Prof Coovadia mentioned the lack of political will in our country in terms of fighting HIV, but that at last a programme is in place to provide free ARV treatment, although there is a massive strain on the country's medical resources to provide this at the scale necessary.

After the presentation and discussion time, we asked participants to provide a short evaluation of the forum. The general consensus was that a forum such as this was hugely beneficial, providing opportunities for networking and obtaining updates on the latest information and developments in the HIV/AIDS field.

The next meeting took place on the 19 July 2006 where representatives of various organizations on the South Coast (Margate and Port Shepstone areas) were invited to present on their HIV-related services/activities. This forum was arranged as a direct response to requests from the local community to learn more about who was providing such services on the South Coast. This proved to be an informative and important meeting, helping to strengthen local HIV-related networks and collaborations. The following organizations were represented:

• South Coast Hospice
• Place of Restoration
• Rehoboth Children?’s Village
• Child Welfare South Africa ?– Port Shepstone
• loveLife


Where possible, presentations have been uploaded on the righthand side of this page.