PRIZE WINNERS 2000-First Winner

First Category For projects by UN, international and regional organizations.

Zimbabwe is a country with a full-blown AIDS epidemic:

• Between 20 and 25% of all adults are HIV positive.
• There are over 600.000 Orphans – Children under 15 years who have lost one or both parents to AIDS.
• The government of Zimbabwe estimated this figure to rise to 900000 by the year 2005.
• 220 people die every day, this means one person every 7 minutes.
• 3 out of 5 of all newly infected are young people, between 15 – 24 years.

Based on the fact that the problem of AIDS epidemic in Southern Africa is the most sever health problem, the TCE- Total Control of the Epidemic, has been created, after many years of work to gain better experience and understanding into the scope of the problem and its related social and cultural dimensions. The project aims at achieving total control over the spread of AIDS epidemic within 3 years, through education and community mobilization and counseling from person to person and village to village. The number of direct beneficiaries of the project is 100.000 representing the population of the area covered by the TCE program, which is a part of a project entitled HOPE, implemented by Humana People to People .

The project begins by dividing the country into districts and every district into geographical area with approximately 100.000 people. In each area work 50 TCE officers, who were locally trained in educating the public on HIV/AIDS prevention and how to mobilize the people to take control over the epidemic and its effects both in their own lives and in their communities. Each TCE officer is responsible for 2000 persons and works under the supervision of two supervisors. Under this method every man, women and child in the community is mobilized to stop the spread of the epidemic.

The project is considered to be a unique and realistic approach to confront the AIDS problem, not only because it covers a large geographical area but also because it is very cost effective . The basic cost for the project is $ 1 per person Per your, for 3 year (300,000). This means that the total cost of the project is 300,000 to liberate 100,000 persons.

The TCE is also considered to be innovative and pioneering because it is a systematic and comprehensive approach to educate every member of the community and mobilize them to become actively involved in stopping the epidemic, within the framework of a concrete strategy based on the fact that (only people can liberate themselves from AIDS epidemic, every body else can only participate).

The impact of the project on the surrounding environment is very immense, because it works with the communities to stop the epidemic, help the infected people and enable the comminutes to work together so it encourages communication and cooperation. The project was designed to work for all countries of Southern Africa.