‘Health Goals Malawi’ is a two-year project in partnership with the LFC Foundation, using football as a convenor to engage with hard to reach adolescent and young males aged 14-24 with health services, particularly HIV self-testing. The project aims to reduce the transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases in Malawi, by raising awareness of support services and educating young people about the risks.
The project uses the diverse skillset to strengthen the capacity of community coaches to:
- Deliver inclusive, well organised, and effective football sessions to youth.
- Use these sessions to promote discussion about HIV, HIV self-testing, and other issues relevant to youth.
- Sustain football as a platform where partners such as MLW and PSI can periodically engage with youth, to provide health services or information about local research.
In Malawi, the number of people living with HIV is one of the highest in the world and young people account for 50% of new infections. Incidences are highest among 14-24 year olds. Often these groups have low levels of awareness and access to contraceptive health services, therefore more likely to contract, or be living with, the disease unknowingly. Knowing their HIV status is the first step to living longer.
In the first year of delivery, the project engaged more than 600 young males. LFC’s star player Sadio Mane, worked with us to create a film where he demonstrated how easy it was to use a self-testing kit in a bid to raise awareness of the intervention, which can be carried out in private with results taking just 20 minutes to come through.
We are about on embark on the second year of the project in June 2019.
Find out more…
For further information about this project or others like this, please contact Stacey Lavery by emailing Stacey.Lavery@lstmed.ac.uk or call (+44) 0151 705 3778.