Our partners
Health Academies & Youth Centres
Africaid seeks to set up WhizzKids United Health Academies, which serve an exclusively adolescent patient population with vital clinical services such as HIV testing, counselling, treatment and management of sexually transmitted diseases, administration and management of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment, and psycho-social support groups for kids living with HIV/AIDS. Staff will be fully qualified and receive additional training to meet the needs of adolescents. The Health Academies also feature a football pitch and computer resource centre, and offer other services such as football leagues, homework clubs, career guidance, and educational videos. They are integrated with the football fun of WhizzKids United. By making our Health Academies as youth-friendly as possible we will increase the number of kids willing to access their life-saving health services, as it is notoriously difficult to get youth to attend traditional clinics. The Health Academy model presents an exciting opportunity for cooperation between Africaid and government health structures. WhizzKids United Youth Centres are a scaled-down alternative to Health Academies which offer constructive, educational leisure activities, one-on-one counselling, and occasional visits from nurses who offer voluntary HIV testing.Outcomes:
WhizzKids United Health Academies...
- Bring long-term sustainability to the other WhizzKids United programme components
- Address a gap in health service delivery targeting adolescents
- Provides a holistic range of services free of charge in an adolescent-friendly, non-judgmental environment
- Give kids a venue of which they can take ownership and see it as 'their place'
- Allow kids to access health services without the stigma attached to attending a "clinic"
- Demonstrate to youth that the community is interested in addressing their health needs
- Increase youth uptake of voluntary counselling and testing (VCT)
- Increase antiretroviral (ARV) coverage of HIV-infected adolescents