Uganda's success in combating AIDS lies in the fact that the government recognized the problem and mobilized all its resources for the fight. The single most effective tool used is education. The initiative is based on the premise that educating girls empowers them and provides them with the opportunity, the tools and the know-how, therefore, the option to make a living. Selling their bodies would no longer be their only hope for survival.
Girls learn to take care of themselves and of others in their family.
It is a most precious tool in a society where women are battling an inferiority complex compounded by the oppressive poverty and the abuse they are exposed to all their lives. Rather than deny the problem, as seen to devastating results in other African countries, Ugandans have learned to accept it and approach it and its victims with understanding and compassion. Ssempala stated - a reality resounding not only in Uganda, but also all over the world in the dawn of the new century. Copyright 2000 Startec. All Rights Reserved.