The Africa HIV/AIDS Desk Coordinator, Kofi Agama officially launched a $ 66,000 HIV/AIDS project for the Bible Society of Sierra Leone at the British Council yesterday.
Mr Agama said Sierra Leone was the first English-speaking country to benefit from such project. He said 13 countries had now launched the initiative.
He said “as Christians the message of HIV/AIDS must be spread in the churches to let people know about the causes, effect and ways to prevent the epidemic.”
Konstanse Raen, who was the guest speaker, said the Project is called the Good Samaritan package. She said that with the bible and information about HIV/AIDS “we want to stop the epidemic and support people infected and affected by it.
Mrs Raen went on to say that the Good Samaritan Package was built on the story of the biblical Good Samaritan and was divided into five chapters.
She thanked the government of Sierra Leone, UN agencies and nongovernmental organisations for joining hands to fight against HIV/AIDS.
Director General in the Ministry of Education Science and Technology, William Taylor said HIV/AIDS remained a social and economic threat to mankind.
He said education had been described as “the vaccine against the epidemic”.
The Capacity Development Specialist from the National AIDS Secretariat, Dily Thompson said they were impressed and gratified by the work of Bible Society in fighting against the epidemic.
She said NAS had been working with the inter-religious council to form a network of faith-base organisations in the country to unite in the fight against the pandemic.
Dily pledged NAS’s technical support to the Bible Society in implementing the project. She said that the Good Samaritan package would go a long way in addressing the issues of HIV.
Allocating the $66,000 project the Executive Secretary of the Bible Society, Ruby Pearce said the project was a two-year programme. She said the fund was from the Republic of Denmark.
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