Sofia, August 23, 2019
With an official green light on August 23, as of Sep 1st BFPA starts activities on a new project – “I WANT TO KNOW – User friendly access to HIV and STI counseling and testing for Roma youth from vulnerable communities”, supported by ViiV Healthcare’s Positive Action Programme via CAF (Charities Aid Foundation) UK. The project’s duration is 2 years, during which BFPA will provide voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) with a focus on young Roma men (but not excluding women as well) from poor and marginalized districts through its coordinators in the five BFPA branches in Bulgaria - Pleven, Stara Zagora, Plovdiv, Russe and Sofia. Activities will begin with a kick-off meeting and VCT training for the service providers, in parallel with informing and awareness raising by elaboration of info materials, disseminated in the targeted communities by one of the closest and dearest BFPA partners – Health Mediators.
The initiative continues with an informational quiz on HIV and other STIs and those who complete it will receive a free HIV test as a reward, which will be performed in the BFPA branches. Besides that, the BFPA teams will perform one-day field activities in 4 marginalized communities for each location, which will include information dissemination, counseling sessions and free HIV testing. In case of positive HIV tests, the clients will be referred for treatment to the relevant health establishments. All of the information gathered during the project – facts, true stories, statistical results from testing, etc., will be aggregated, and as a summary will be published as a factsheet, handed to local and government authorities to promote the benefits of testing for prevention of HIV prevalence and create sustainable project results.
We at BFPA are very excited to get the new project under way and for the chance to provide much needed services to people with a generally difficult access to healthcare. We are looking forward to working with people in different locations and reaching new people with information and services.
