Methodology

The prevention and communication campaign foreseen by the project aims in particular to raise the awareness and most importantly increase the knowledge of communities and ethnic groups still linked to traditions and superstitions often resulting in attitudes and dynamics which go against the dignity of the weakest and most powerless individuals. In general, in Cameroon sexuality is often practiced with great superficiality, and even it couldn’t be a problem from a general point of view, it became a priority issue as sexuality involves those dynamics linked to exploitation, infectious diseases, and traditional surgical practices. The prevention campaign will therefore have to provide answers not only to the problems listed above, but also to the central HIV issue.

This will be possible by resorting to a communication and training campaign which will not be confined to sex education, but which will also have to educate people on how to adopt sexually responsible behaviours, based on the awareness that one of the leading ways in which the HIV virus is transmitted is through unprotected sex. To this effect, a fundamental aspect is that of the production of the dissemination material foreseen by the project. In this context, the involvement of local operators in the production of the said material and communication campaign is essential in order to overcome those social barriers which continue to prevent solving this problem at global level, since it would help to better define and have an impact on the local reality, by avoiding a Europe-centred or, more in general, Western-world centred approach, which often causes African people to respond very negatively to such initiatives.