HIV/AIDS awareness needs to be taught in
the context of wider health education, according to practitioners.
"HIV/AIDS education is not something isolated. Its all about avoiding
risky behaviour, learning healthy life skills and decision making, which
are not only responsible for HIV/AIDS but can cause several other physical
and mental disorders," Naureen Butt, programme officer at the Aga Khan
Education Services Pakistan (AKESP) told IRIN from southern port city of
Karachi, capital of Sindh province, on Friday.

More than 60 percent of the country's population is below the age of 25,
with half of them approaching the age of sexual activity. But
non-availability of proper guidance and counselling to adolescents in
general and particularly in schools, is a social problem in Pakistan
exposing young people to HIV infection.

"We are at conceptual stage as yet. We need to tackle other communicable
diseases, as well as challenges and issues of adolescence, by integrating
the information in a religious and cultural perspective to enhance general
health," Butt added.
Educational authorities in collaboration with the UN Educational and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO), two years ago, developed a guidebook for
schoolteachers containing information about HIV/AIDS and other adolescence
issues.

"For the first time a teacher guidebook has been published on such
sensitive issues considered taboo in the country," Arshad Saeed Khan, a
programme officer at UNESCO, told IRIN in the capital Islamabad.

The 'Teacher Guidebook on moral and health education of Adolescents',
published in Urdu language only, contains useful information on
adolescence, sexually transmitted diseases, negative effects of drugs or
narcotics, modes of transmission of HIV/AIDS and prevention measures.

"The text of teachers' manual was developed after a long process of
consultations, creative work, and review meetings, so that it could be
made acceptable for all sections of society" Khan added.

The copies of guidebook have been distributed to nearly 166 teacher
training institutes throughout the country. But "mass-scale orientation is
needed for some 700,000 primary and secondary school teachers to
disseminate information about the proper use of  the guidebook," Aurangzeb
Rehman, dealing with the project at the curriculum wing of the education
ministry told IRIN.

"Being a traditional Islamic society, it has not been possible so far to
include information about HIV/AIDS, adolescence or reproductive health in
school textbooks. The issue has been a cause of concern among the
teachers, parents and in religious circles," he added.

Nabia Farah, a programme officer at SAHIL, an NGO working against child
sexual abuse, told IRIN in Islamabad: "We received positive feedback from
female participants, both students and teachers, during our training
sessions in secondary schools in the cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi."

The government and private sector have been working to make young people
aware of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and provide information and skills about
reproductive health and other adolescence issues.

An effective evaluation and monitoring system should be in place to check
the impact and acceptance level of the teachers, students, parents and of
community in general to take the programme to a national level, health
activists stressed.