SHARING HEALTH KNOWLEDGE: Pathfinder International helps create safe havens for learning and life skills development to help save young lives in Vietnam.
Johnson & Johnson participated in the International AIDS Conference 2012, held July 22-27, 2012, in Washington, DC.
An 18-year-old girl, a participant in an adolescent health program, describes the heartache of being away from her very first love, a university student studying far from her home of Can Tho city, Vietnam, whom she sees only twice a month.
“I miss him a lot when he returns to the university and he misses me too,” she writes.
She writes that she feels pressured to initiate an intimate relationship with her boyfriend, and also fearful that saying no will hurt him and risk their relationship.
Lessons and Life Skills
An estimated 62 percent of Vietnamese infected with HIV are under the age of 30 and 40 percent of all new HIV infections occur in youth ages 15 to 24.
Despite the disproportionate vulnerability of young Vietnamese, a recent government report revealed that only 46 percent of youth surveyed could correctly identify ways to prevent sexual transmission of HIV.
Young people need safe forums to share their concerns about HIV and sexual and reproductive health and learn where they can find quality sexual and reproductive health services if needed. By grounding this information in life-skills-building exercises and educational games, young people can respond to real situations that often characterize adolescence – such as deciding when to have sex – and confidently protect themselves.
A Path to Knowledge
Since 2004, Pathfinder International Vietnam has responded to the sexual and reproductive health needs of young people. With support from Johnson & Johnson, Pathfinder launched a health learning program for in- and out-of-school youth in Can Tho city and Thai Nguyen province to change attitudes and improve knowledge about HIV through life skills-based education.
By the end of November 2011, 126 life skills sessions were held in eleven project sites in Can Tho city and Thai Nguyen province and reached approximately 10,300 young people, including a young woman newly in love and facing a big decision with her first boyfriend.
“I remembered our life-skills forums where we had an opportunity to deal with similar scenarios. I was confident to share with him my feelings, my nervousness and my expectation that I preferred to delay,” she says. “He agreed with me and showed respect to me. I was very happy.”
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