This report is a commissioned review of best practice as well as an exploratory study in two countries, Namibia and Tanzania, to understand how the education sector should support HIV-positive learners at school.
In a context in which HIV and AIDS is affecting many lives around the globe, education has been described as the most effective 'social vaccine' against this pandemic. Getting every child into school seems to be essential to mitigate the impact of HIV and AIDS.
It is estimated that there are currently around 122,000 teachers in sub- Saharan Africa who are living with HIV, the vast majority of whom have not sought testing and do not know their HIV status.
Studies of the relationship between HIV/AIDS and children’s educational attainment largely focus on the direct impacts of parental illness and death, overlooking the potential indirect impact that parental knowledge and perceptions of their HIV status may have on children’s school enrollment.
Objective: To assess the evidence that the association between educational attainment and risk of HIV infection is changing over time in sub-Saharan Africa. Design and methods: Systematic review of published peer-reviewed articles.
The Namibian Ministry of Education has developed an effective programme in order to implement National Policy on HIV and AIDS for the Education Sector. This programme is into the implementation phase.
In recent years, the education sector in low-income countries has come to play an increasingly important role in the health of the school-aged child.
Education has a potentially important role to play in tackling the spread of HIV, but is there evidence that this potential is realized?
More than forty percent of teacher deaths in Malawi are related to HIV/AIDS, making AIDS-related death the most common cause of teacher attrition.
This generic integration module is an output of the UNESCO/AWSE in-country Training Workshops on Mainstreaming HIV/AIDS for Physical and Engineering Sciences in Ghana, Rwanda, Botswana and Uganda.