BNYC to focus on Safe Male Circumcision

BABOKI KAYAWE
Staff Writer | Tuesday February 28, 2012 00:00

 

A communication from the BNYC public relations and strategy manager, Wanetsha Mosinyi said MYAA would focus on mobilising young people to uptake SMC, in an effort to support the national strategy.

The Minister of Youth, Sport and Culture Shaw Kgathi will officiate at the event commemorated under the theme 'Take Responsibility, Take Action' and the tagline Wise up, 'Be smart, Get Trimmed'.

Safe male circumcision is one of the add-on strategies aimed at preventing the HIV/AIDS scourge.

The Minister for Presidential Affairs and Public Administration Mokgweetsi Masisi told the nation at the 2011 World AIDS Day commemoration in Moshupa last December that since its introduction, government was working tirelessly to circumcise 467,000 HIV negative males by 2016.

At the time, he said the coverage rate stood at 12.6 percent. He added that the target of 80 percent was still a long way off for the remaining four years.

Even so, with the O Icheke Kgaola Chaene campaign against multiple concurrent sexual partnerships, the WISE UP Youth multi-media campaign, the Youth Counselling on Air programme, and the Mobile Population project on top of other interventions, the road to 2016 should be accelerated. In June 1996, the BNYC, Botswana Christian Council (BCC), AIDS/STD Unit under the Ministry of Health and the Department of Culture and Youth realised the need to formulate a strategy to upscale HIV and AIDS interventions to groups not initially targeted in the fight.

The government then designated March as a month during which young people, in collaboration with various partners, hold HIV and AIDS sensitisation, community mobilisation and outreach, and advocacy campaigns throughout the country.  This is an annual event held with the intention to raise the nation's (especially youth) HIV and AIDS awareness level and to enhance their resolve to fight the pandemic.

Activities for this year's MYAA include mobilising youth to undergo circumcision at designated hospitals and mobile clinics.  After Palapye, the campaign will cover areas such as Serowe, Maun, Gaborone, Francistown, Kanye, Mochudi and Molepolole.