On August 22, the Department of HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control ( Ministry of Health ) informed about the activities of the Black Rose - Black Rainbow group, taking blood for HIV testing for students in Do Son district, Hai Phong city.
Accordingly, the Black Rose group is a self-help group, often called a community-based organization, participating in HIV/AIDS prevention and control activities since August 2011.
The house was rented by the Black Rose group as an office. Photo: PT
This group is implementing the project "Protecting the Future - Strengthening new community-based interventions to control HIV infection among young drug users in Vietnam" in Hai Son ward, Do Son district, Hai Phong city.
The group has a cooperation agreement from December 2022 with the Center for Supporting Community Development Initiatives (SCDI), with funding from the French organization Expertise France.
The HIV/AIDS Prevention Department said that the Black Rose group has cooperated with two projects to carry out activities including reaching out and intervening with clients who are drug users aged 16 to 24 to participate in behavioral screening research; HIV counseling and testing; reaching out to groups with high-risk behaviors such as people who have sex with men (MSM); people who inject drugs, conducting HIV testing in the community; referring people infected with HIV for treatment...
The Black Rose Group has five members, one of whom has attended a training course on HIV testing counseling in the community.
According to the initial report of the Hai Phong Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the SCDI Center, from January 1 to August 18, this group provided HIV testing counseling to 204 people and all had negative results.
HIV testing in the community. Illustration photo
However, according to the Department of HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control, information about the age of people tested for HIV may not be accurate because people tested self-report their age and do not present identification documents before taking the test.
In addition, the sponsor also agreed in the activity plan to support payment for participants receiving testing consultation services of 100,000 VND. This is travel support and payment of 25,000 VND when introducing another person to participate. Therefore, the group's payment for testing participants is in accordance with the project outline approved by the competent authority.
Regarding the HIV screening test technique, the group used a rapid test kit to take blood from the fingertip. According to the representative of the Department of HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control, this is a simple technique, using a disposable finger prick needle (designed for single use, once used, the needle retracts and cannot be reused) to lightly prick the fingertip, then squeeze out a drop of blood to do a test similar to a blood sugar monitoring test.
In addition, the group also uses oral fluid self-testing. This technique uses oral fluid to perform HIV screening tests.
These HIV testing techniques are all permitted by the Ministry of Health for use in the community, as this is a simple sampling method and ensures no infection.
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