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African Microenterprise AIDS Initiative: Preventing the Spread of HIV/AIDS by Empowering Women in Africa
How does the African Microenterprise AIDS Initiative intend to combat HIV/AIDS in the continent?
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This document provides details of the African Microenterprise AIDS Initiative conceived by Opportunity International and its seven African Partners. The initiative intends to provide women and their families with the resources and skills necessary to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS.
The foundation for this new program will be "Trust Banks", pioneered by Grameen Bank in Bangladesh.
The document states that the African Microenterprise AIDS Initiative will:
- Directly benefit one and a half million people in its first five years, five million over the next ten years, and millions into the future;
- Give women the choice to say no or negotiate safer sex;
- Reduce the rate of infections among formerly impoverished women and provide economic support to AIDS widows and orphans;
- Impede the spiraling economic consequences of the AIDS pandemic.
It concludes that:
- Opportunity International and the African Microenterprise AIDS Initiative will bring dignity to disadvantaged women and families;
- They will help these people see that their lives can be different and that change is possible;
- By joining together with one another in Trust Banks, women in thousands of communities will transform desperate societies.