The Umbrella of Organizations of Persons with Disabilities in the fight against HIV/AIDS and for Health Promotion (UPHLS) is working hard to assist its members who have exhibited greater need in regard to illiteracy on the pandemic.
UPHLS received Grant from Global Fund for 10years to implement different projects aimed at developing and disseminating guidelines for the inclusion of PWDs in HIV/AIDS programs.
Through this sponsorship, UPHLS organizes outreach campaigns led by trained peer educators where they meet community members including those with disabilities by using communication tools adapted to different categories of disabilities.
Olivier Ndagijimana, program Director of UPHLS says that it was an uphill task to change the negative mindset of the community in regard to People with disabilities and the place they deserve in the society.
Additionally, most of persons with disabilities in the community are not literate and it is difficult for them to get information on HIV/AIDS.
Persons with disabilities particularly those with speaking and hearing impairment, visually impairment persons, and those with mental impairment are still abused sexually.
Unfortunately it is still difficult to report the perpetrators due to communication barriers.
Confidentiality is still a problem as the health providers have no skills on how to communicate with persons with hearing impairment so they prefer to work with their assistants instead.
For this reason, some of PWDs are not able to participate in awareness creation campaigns organized by the project because of their disabilities and lack of assisting devices/tools like wheelchair, crutches, white can and interpreters of sign language.
To mitigate these barriers, Ndagijimana says that there is a need of disability issues to be mainstreamed in all services/ sectors, adding to HIV prevention social economic impact mitigation, assisting PWDs with HIV/AIDS.
This should be coupled with promoting Income Generating Activities (IGAs) among PWDs to address poverty issue.
There should be organized raining of health providers on disability and their specific needs. The training would benefit staff and Health care service providers in sign language.
There should also be community mobilization among local leaders, families of PWDs and community members at large on disability and specific need to address problem of stigma and discrimination.
Although, some PWDs are still facing many challenges in accessing health care services especially those related to HIV/AIDS information, they applaud the progress made by some who have joined health services.
Some of them have enrolled to antiretroviral treatment and joined cooperatives to break away from loneliness and stigmatization.
PWDs is thankful to the government for having signed and ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).
On top of that, the country put in place policies meant to protect people with disabilities from being excluded to building an inclusive society with the slogan of ‘Leave No One Behind’