It has been confirmed that WVP Kenya, with support from the Chello Foundation, will be taking an additional 140 children and youths to school in 2010. We will then have over 400 scholars in school. In 2010, WVP Kenya will for the first time take five students to university and other specialised institutions. We have commenced the identification of scholars and look forward to welcome 140 enthusiastic students to our scholarship programme.
WVP Kenya has started a three month fundraising campaign in the UK. The aim of the campaign is to have 100 people sign up for payroll giving/give as you earn. Details of the campaign are listed below: *Become a WVP member for as little as £1 a month!* *Helping the neediest Kenyan children in the most effective way* *100% of donations will go directly to the children we support* *Fill out the form below to join our journey!* (post it to the Charities Aid Foundation, 25 Kings Hill Avenue, Kings Hill, West Malling, Kent ME19 4TA) The recession has had an impact on everyone. However, those hardest hit live in sub-Saharan Africa. The global recession has affected local businesses and opportunities in Kenya and the recent instability in the country has inflated food prices. As the recession takes its toll on the GDP of the G-8 states, so will the amounts of money allocated to foreign aid. These changes are now exacerbating the high levels of poverty and infectious diseases that Kenya continues to battle with. WVP Kenya is helping some of the most vulnerable households in western Kenya cope with poverty and disease. We also work to give children a fair start to life by providing them with scholarships so they can fulfill their potential and contribute to the prosperity of Kenya. We need your help to combat disease and poverty in western Kenya. As you too are also likely to be feeling the impact of recession, we would like to introduce a scheme that allows you to pledge more than you will end up donating. The scheme is called payroll giving (or give as you earn) and applies to UK residents with a salary and those on a PAYE pension. You can chose to donate as much as you like each month from your pre-tax salary, so money that would normally go to the tax-people will instead go to WVP Kenya. All donations that you make through your salary are totally tax free, which means it costs you less to give. An example: If you are in the 20% tax rate and pledge £10, it will in reality only cost you £8 If you are in the 40% tax rate, it will only cost you £6 to pledge £10 to WVP Kenya. We think that's a very good deal. You can join our journey by either asking your employer for information about payroll giving/give as you earn. They will provide you with a form to fill out. Alternatively, the link above has a form which you can post directly to the Charities Aid Foundation. The details you need are: Charity Name: World Voices Positive (WVP Kenya) Charity Commission number: 1119300 CAF Sponsorship number: 21000527660 Our address: 24 Sumner Street, SE1 9JA London Should you wish to sign up for this scheme you will automatically become a member of WVP Kenya. We have four types of memberships: Monthly pledges: £1-4 (BRONZE) £5-9 (SILVER) £10-39 (GOLD) £40+ (PLATINUM) All members will receive a gift and a membership certificate from WVP Kenya with their welcome and introduction pack and receive regular updates of how donations raised from this scheme are being put to use. Our aim is to raise £1000 every month from this scheme. All we need is 100 people to sign up to this scheme who pledge £10 each. This would enable us to help hundreds of children fulfill their potential, free from diseases. If you would like to join us in our journey and become a member and have submitted a payroll giving form with your employer, please e-mail us your name, postal address and size of pledge to join@wvpkenya.org.uk Should you not wish to commit to the payroll giving scheme, you can pledge a one-off donation or set up a standing order through our website We would greatly appreciate if you could spread the word of our campaign and invite others to join. If you have any questions, please email Morten on m.skovdal@wvpkenya.org.uk NAIROBI, 10 September 2009 (PlusNews) - Kenyan AIDS authorities are struggling to restore public confidence in condoms after an alarming news report recently showed locally stocked brands to be defective. KTN, a local TV station, showed the condoms, purchased from vendors in the capital, Nairobi, being tested by the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS). Subjected to an electronic “freedom from holes” test, which involves filling them with water, the condoms sprung leaks. "This will seriously affect the confidence of those who have always been consistent in using them - how do members of the public know what brand is safe and which is not?" asked Hilary Okoth, a 30-year-old Nairobi resident. "Imagine a woman who is supposed to negotiate condom use as they are always told," he added. "The man will simply tell her 'those things leak, it doesn’t make a difference'." Hot, one of the condom brands featured in the news report, was recently banned in Zambia after the Zambia Bureau of Standards found holes in them. Assurances According to Nicholas Muraguri, director of the National AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases Control Programme, NASCOP, most condoms imported into the country are of sound quality. "I want to assure Kenyans that those are isolated cases and the condoms that are distributed by the government - which account for 75 percent of what is used - are actually of high quality and pass WHO [UN World Health Organization] standards," he told IRIN/PlusNews. KEBS - responsible for quality control of products sold in Kenya - does not routinely test imported condoms. "We cannot deny there are cases of low quality condoms in the country because they have not been passing through the Kenya Bureau of Standards for quality assurance," Muraguri said. "The government is joking; how can a product that involves saving human life be allowed into the country without going through rigorous quality tests?" Okoth questioned. Muraguri said NASCOP had asked KEBS to test all brands of condoms sold in Kenya for safety, with a view to banning those found to be defective; the bureau is due to release a preliminary report on 11 September. "I think we need to do more in monitoring the condoms that enter the country," said James Gesami, assistant minister of public health. "We are endangering the lives of our people by letting condoms that cannot stand the quality test into the market." Condoms are a key component of Kenya's HIV prevention strategy, with at least 160 million distributed in the country annually by the government. JOHANNESBURG (PlusNews) - An attempt to help educators around the world develop sex-education programmes as a way to reduce unwanted pregnancies and the spread of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among young people has become bogged down in controversy. The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in partnership with several other UN agencies, reviewed 87 studies and consulted a long list of experts on sexuality education to draft the 98-page International Guidelines on Sexuality Education. The guidelines are still being finalized but a draft version suggests key areas that a sex education curriculum should cover at four different age levels between five and 18. The topics include relationships, reproduction, gender inequality and various aspects of sexuality, but conservative groups in the United States have focused on a handful of suggested learning areas that they view as overly explicit and inappropriate for young children. A report published on the news web site, Foxnews.com, zeroes in on the issue of masturbation, which the UNESCO guidelines suggest teachers begin discussing with children aged 5 to 8. "At that age they should be learning about ... the proper name of certain parts of their bodies, certainly not about masturbation," Michelle Turner, president of the Maryland-based Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, is quoted as saying. Turner was also "disturbed" by the recommendation that the subject of abortion be introduced to children as young as nine. Various critics have taken issue with suggestions that teachers discuss homosexuality, contraception, and gender-based violence. An evidence-based document Statements by UNESCO as well as the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), which helped develop the document, have defended it as an evidence-based strategy for reducing HIV infection in young people, and improving their sexual and reproductive health. They cite data from the International Planned Parenthood Federation showing that every year at least 111 million new cases of STIs occur among young people aged between 10 and 24, and up to 4.4 million girls aged 15 to 19 seek abortions, most of which are unsafe. According to UNAIDS, 45 percent of new HIV infections occur among people between 15 and 24 years old. “At the moment, education is the best weapon we have for dealing with these issues,” said Mark Richmond, UNESCO director of the Division for the Coordination of UN Priorities in Education. "Evidence tells us that by and large young people do not have access to the knowledge that could help them make informed decisions ... the new guidelines contribute to filling this gap." Anticipating many of the objections, a lengthy section of the document, called "The rationale for sexuality education", notes that one of the challenges is to reach young people "before they become sexually active, whether ... through choice, necessity or coercion". "These International Guidelines emphasize the importance of addressing the reality of young people’s sexual lives: this includes those aspects of which policy-makers and others may personally disapprove," the authors noted. "Decision-makers with a duty of care have to recognize that good scientific evidence and public health imperatives should take priority over personal opinion." Michael Bennish, executive director of Mpilonhle, a South African-based NGO providing health and HIV-prevention education to schools, described the objections to “a very balanced and thoughtful document” as “ideologically-driven”. “I think there’s substantial evidence that sex education does not lead to irresponsible sexual activity,” he told IRIN/PlusNews. “There are age-appropriate ways to talk about sex ... and kids are sexual from an early age; they’re curious about their anatomy and procreation, and it’s better they have the right information than the wrong information.” A report in the New York Times on 1 September asserted that the controversy had caused the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), a key partner, to pull out of the project, but a UNFPA spokesperson refused to confirm this, saying only that the organisation was still in discussion with UNESCO about making the publication “more context-specific”. Another criticism by conservative commentators was that the guidelines took a one-size-fits-all, culturally insensitive approach. Mary Beth Hastings, deputy director of the Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE), a US-based NGO, disagreed. “I think conservative groups tend to blow anything about sexuality, particularly regarding children, out of proportion and they do so because of their agenda,” she told IRIN/PlusNews. “There are fundamental truths about child sexuality that have to be dealt with. I think the guidelines allow countries to adapt to their culture but still understand that children are going through a process that has to be addressed.” The guidelines will be formally launched at the United Nations in New York at the end of October. Hastings said she hoped the debate would not detract from the original aim of providing sexuality education as part of global HIV-prevention efforts. “With the extent of HIV transmission, particularly among young women, I think this could be a tremendous tool,” she said. Online at: http://www.plusnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=86013 JOHANNESBURG (IRIN/Plus News) — Girls who have been orphaned may be twice as likely to experience sexual abuse, according to research from child-friendly clinics in Zimbabwe's capital, Harare. Dr. Eunice Lyn Garura, Director of the Family Support Trust, an NGO operating clinics for survivors of sexual abuse, said 30 percent of the predominantly female clients were orphans who had lost both parents. The Trust runs four clinics, including one in Harare Central Hospital, which caters to some of the city's high-density areas. Research showed that vulnerability had been exacerbated by government “clean-up” efforts, such as Operation Murambatsvina, which forcibly removed many orphaned and vulnerable children (OVC) and their families from their homes and left them living on the street. Greater numbers of children coming to the clinic reported abuse, and higher percentages reported they had been raped or abused by strangers. Delays in Disclosing mean Delays in Treatment Almost 90 percent of orphans arrived at Harare Central Hospital clinic too late for post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP), which must be administered within 72 hours of HIV exposure to prevent infection, said Garura, who presented her findings at the Sexual Violence Research Initiative Forum in Johannesburg, South Africa, this week. The delay was often due to the children's difficulty in disclosing abuse, usually to older female relatives such as mothers, aunts or grandmothers. “Young children can't verbalize when abuse has taken place, and it takes time for them to disclose,” she said. “Often, we adults don't want to believe this could happen to my child ... there's ... denial.” Teenage girls, the highest percentage of clinic users, were also hesitant to disclose abuse - often by their boyfriends - for fear of admitting to relatives that they were sexually active. About six percent of the children participating in the research were found to be HIV-positive after suffering abuse, but researchers could not say whether their status was as a direct consequence. Garura warned that HIV prevalence among the survivors was likely to be higher, as many children were tested in the “window period”, before HIV tests were likely to detect infection. She called for more research on the possible links between orphanhood and vulnerability and sexual abuse among Zimbabwe's children, who were experiencing economic conditions unprecedented in the country's history. WVP Kenya has got itself a new space to share its work. We hope you like it and will send us an email with feedback and suggestions on how we could make it even better. | join our email list for updatesArchivesMay 2012 CategoriesAll |
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