Africa Centre for HIV/Aids Management

Since its inception in 2003, the Africa Centre for HIV/Aids Management has been a leading force in the fight against HIV/Aids through the implementation of various preventative and educational programmes.

The Centre offers comprehensive HIV/Aids academic training programmes. These include the Postgraduate Diploma in HIV/Aids Management (PDM), as well as an MPhil programme. The aim of these programmes is to empower people to take control of the pandemic and to reach out to those affected by the disease. Driven by excellence and relevance, the Centre has awarded more than 1 500 postgraduate diplomas to students from 45 countries over the last 10 years.

The Centre's community mobilisation programme under the leadership of Prof Jimmie Earl Perry, the first UNAIDS National Goodwill Ambassador to South Africa, has been a huge success, using educational theatre as a basic tool to create awareness of HIV/Aids.

Over 200 000 people have viewed the well-known HIV-focused mini-musical, Lucky the Hero, over the last four years. More than 70% of those now know their status after being tested at performances. The main objective is to provide basic information on HIV/AIDS to mainly Afrikaans-speaking, Coloured communities on farms in the Western Cape and to motivate them to get tested. A similar production, Lucky Fish!, has been tailor-made for the corporate sector.

The Centre has formed many local and international partnerships, with among others UNAIDS as a collaboration centre, and for the next five years the Centre has been contracted to duplicate, upscale and roll out the educational theatre performances via the church sector in all nine provinces on behalf of the Ecumenical Foundation of Southern Africa (EFSA), and the National Religious Association for Social Development (NRASD).

To accommodate its growing activities and to step up its HIV/Aids projects, the Centre has identified a need for a building and additional management assistance to manage the Centre together with all the new projects under one umbrella. It is envisaged that the new building will house offices and a 300-seat community theatre.

 

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