Ruvheneko Project

April 2004 - March 2008

Zimbabwe is one of the countries most severely affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Zimbabwe has a total population of 11.6 million, of which 58 percent and 51 percent are rural and female. Unicef estimates that adult HIV prevalence is about 24.6 percent in Zimbabwe. Most of the infected are asymptomatic and therefore not aware of their status. This puts an even higher proportion of the population at risk of infection. At least 1.8 million people, including children, are living with HIV and AIDS, and the orphan population ranges from 1.5 to 1.8 million children under the age of 15 years. This constitutes about one-third of the population under 18 years (6.6 million). About half of the people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) are women. The available evidence shows that women are more vulnerable to HIV infection with 42 percent reporting condom use at last risky sexual encounter compared to 69 percent for men.

In response to this situation Pact designed the Comprehensive Rural Church and Community HIV/AIDS Prevention, Care and Mitigation Program called the Ruvheneko (a Shona word meaning strong searching light) program. The Ruvheneko program primarily targets rural communities hitherto ignored by mainstream HIV/AIDS interventions. The overall goal of the program is to level the rate of new HIV infections in Zimbabwe and develop community momentum and competence for progressively reducing HIV transmission and for mitigating the effects of HIV and AIDS within the community. To achieve this goal Pact proposes to build and enhance the capacity of partner mission hospitals in supporting their communities with high-quality and comprehensive HIV and AIDS prevention, care, and support services.

The program has four overall objectives:

1. To establish 10 full-service VCT Centers at 10 different rural mission hospitals by January 2006
2. To develop and enhance a high quality, full-service system of home-based care within and operated by the church and community surrounding the VCT center
3. To develop and enhance a high quality, full-service system of care and support for orphans and vulnerable children within each community surrounding the VCT center
4. To provide effective and cost-efficient management and high-quality and responsive services (grants management, networking, organizational development, training and technical assistance, resource mobilization, procurement and monitoring and evaluation) to partners in the program.

Funding for the Ruvheneko program is provided by Swedish Sida.

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