WESTERN BUREAU – A programme to train individuals from across St James in the management of HIV/AIDS is in high gear, with the latest batch of trainees receiving certification last Friday.

The programme began last November and is being coordinated by psychologist Dr Beverly Scott of the Family and Parenting Centre in Montego Bay. According to Scott, the programme has translated into better awareness and acceptance among persons who are still ignorant of the disease and its effects.

“What we are doing is to train people in the community to help their neighbours, their friends and families to deal with HIV/AIDS,” the psychologist told the Observer.

Participants, she noted, are trained to deal with the stigma and discrimination associated with the disease even as they are educated on the disease itself, in addition to other sexually transmitted infections. Specifically, she said, programme participants are taught about home-based care and receive training on nutrition, skin-care, how to provide support to the dying, administering blood pressure checks and other elements of crisis counselling.

The overall programme, she added, is comprised of nine workshops – three of which have already been completed.

Each workshop, she explained, lasts between eight and 10 days and is conducted over a four-hour period each day.

Twenty-four people have been trained under the programme over the last six months, with the last batch of programme graduates comprised of eight females and one male.

Canterbury, Mount Salem, Rose Heights, Bogue and Salt Spring are among the communities from which the participants were drawn.

Meanwhile, the programme has yet to train a participant who is infected with the disease. Organisers are hoping that will change in order to give persons living with AIDS an opportunity to share their experiences with the others.

“We are hoping that one day one of them would be able to come and talk to the participants of the workshop so we can understand what they are going through, what their needs are and how we can help them better,” Dr Scott said.

The main trainer in the programme and a member of the St James Parish AIDS Action Committee Donna-Marie Ross Hamilton said the response from the communities has been good and has left members better able to care for persons with the disease.

“We are training people that don’t mind taking care of sick people – it’s their friends, neighbours, families. We sort of guide them into what they are good at, what their gift is,” she said, adding that they were working to have each community establish its own referral system.

The programme is sponsored by the British Government.

Second Secretary at the British High Commission Clara Quantrill said she is pleased with the programme.

“I think it is excellent work that is going on here. I am really pleased that we were able to do our little bit. Much more is needed and this (sponsorship) is a drop in the ocean. But it is very pleasing to see the far way that our little bit has taken the programme. It is the people who make this possible so I am extremely pleased,” Quantrill said.

Studies have revealed that 21 per cent of all babies born in St James to teenage mothers between the ages of 15 and 19 are HIV positive. It is estimated that over 25,000 persons in the parish are carriers of the virus and that only 5,000 or 20 per cent of that number are aware of it. One in every 165 persons within the parish is infected with HIV/AIDS, which is six times the national average.