"Know Your Status" Promotes Benefits of Testing

Building on the experiences of Brazil, Mexico, the United States and others, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has launched a new "Know Your Status" initiative to support member countries that want to increase the number of people who get tested and counseled for HIV.

The web-based initiative outlines actions and provides tools to help health authorities persuade members of the general public to get tested for HIV as the first step in prevention, treatment, and care for the disease. The longer-term goal is to reduce the spread of HIV in the PAHO region and promote universal access to comprehensive care.

PAHO's Know Your Status initiative borrows key elements from Brazil's Fique Sabendo ("Be in the Know") campaign. The centerpiece of the initiative is a toolkit-available online for download-that provides a step-by-step guide for developing a communication strategy, suggested communication tools ranging from posters to T-shirts and coffee mugs, and advice on planning, monitoring, and evaluation of campaigns.

PAHO began promoting the initiative on June 27, HIV Test Awareness Day, which was celebrated by several PAHO member countries for the first time this year. El Salvador's National Program for Sexually Transmitted Infections and HIV/AIDS mounted a $600,000, 18-day campaign that motivated more than 50,000 people to get tested-nearly three times the number of people tested, on average, in an entire month. Long lines of men, women, and young people began forming early at hospitals, clinics, and mobile health facilities throughout the country. Television, radio, and print media provided major coverage of the events. A total of 378 people screened positive for HIV and received counseling on future care and treatment. The campaign received support from PAHO and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The Bahamas, Cuba, and Puerto Rico also organized HIV testing and counseling events around June 27.

In recent years, testing has become much more widely available throughout the PAHO region. Nevertheless, fear, stigma, and lack of confidence in health services continue to prevent some people from getting a test.

Test awareness campaigns seek to highlight the advantages of knowing one's HIV status, to reduce the stigma associated with being HIV-positive, and to bolster the capacity of health services to provide both testing and counseling.

"Research has shown that people are more likely to take the test when it is offered routinely to everyone, rather than to individuals singled out on the basis of stigmatized behavior," said Paulo Lyra, communication advisor in PAHO's HIV/AIDS Unit. "And if we want to reverse the course of the HIV epidemic, more people need to know their HIV status."

Ongoing test awareness campaigns have been carried out in Brazil, whose Fique Sabendo campaign was first launched in 2002, and in Mexico, whose No Tengas Miedo, Hazte la Prueba ("Don't Be Afraid, Take the Test") campaign has focused on men who have sex with men.

PAHO's Know Your Status (in Spanish, Hazte la Prueba) initiative provides support for countries wishing to carry out test awareness campaigns to increase demand for HIV counseling and testing, reduce the spread of PAHO's "Know Your Status" initiative includes a toolkit for custom designing one's own campaign. HIV, and expand access to comprehensive prevention and care, including antiretroviral treatment as needed, for people with HIV.

More information is available online.