The PSI BCC Blog

The Love Test: It's Nothing to Be Scared Of

HIV testing campaigns often rely on a particularly strong emotion to motivate testing -- fear. The new PSI/Swaziland campaign also uses emotion to urge HIV testing. But the campaign bucks traditional fear appeals and instead employs a contrasting sentiment -- love. 

The “Love Test” campaign targets couples, urging them to show their love for each other and test together. The initiative has been widely covered (click here to check out coverage on CNN) and is making an impact in Swaziland. Since the “Love Test” campaign was introduced in April 2009, the number of couples testing has more than tripled, and overall testing has increased by 400% over the previous year.

The campaign also targets men specifically, reaching out to them in places where they congregate. The “Love Test” is even present at the ‘dipping tanks’ where men gather to disinfect their livestock. For more information on Swaziland’s “Love Test,” check out this video on youtube.

 

 

Guest blogger Beth Skorochod is a consultant in the HIV Department.

SCRUTINIZE Campaign Launched

SCRUTINIZE, a new multimedia campaign targeting South African young people aged 18-32, offers an interactive opportunity to learn about HIV. By scrutinizing behaviors, as viewed in short animated commercials known as “animerts,” young people can challenge their preconceived notions and established beliefs concerning risky behavior. These animerts will be broadcast on local television and in public health clinics via Mindset Health television. The campaign will also conduct events and activities at five higher education institutions.

Created in partnership with USAID, the Johns Hopkins Health Education in South Africa (JHHESA), and jeans label Levi's, SCRUTINIZE depicts animated characters in a South African township enacting behaviors that place young people at risk of HIV infection. Some of the topics addressed are risk perception, condom use and safety, multiple concurrent partnerships, transactional and intergenerational sex, and alcohol and sex.

The SCRUTINIZE website provides an interactive forum that allows users to submit summaries of events and community activities, along with pictures, which will be posted on the website. Similarly, certain characters in the animerts have established Facebook sites which encourage young people, particularly in South Africa, to benefit from the social networking of Facebook.

The SCRUTINIZE campaign has plans to broaden its features and will continually update the website with lively material in the interest of “flip[ping] H.I.V. to H.I.Victory.”

Guest blogger Jason Walton is a PSI HIV Department consultant and new media enthusiast.

I Know, Do You?

I couldn't resist one more post for National HIV Testing Day to share a specific campaign developed a couple of years ago by our office in Zambia to address the fact that in a country with such high HIV prevalence, relatively few people knew their HIV status.  They wanted a campaign that would simultaneously address behavioral barriers to testing and encourage people to want to know their status while emphasizing the high quality and confidential counseling and testing services available through New Start clinics.

Their campaign used teaser billboards and posters throughout Zambia that asked "I know, do you?" which were followed up by additional billboards and television and radio spots that tied this tagline to the importance of knowing one's status and seeking counseling and testing services from New Start.  To support the campaign, people who tested and received their results from New Start received a yellow bracelet  with the campaign tagline.  These bracelets ultimately became incredibly popular.

National HIV Testing Day: June 27, 2008

Today is National HIV Testing Day.  With so much focus on HIV in Africa and other countries overseas, we often neglect to think about the HIV epidemic in the United States where more than 40,000 Americans are infected with HIV each year, and it is estimated that 250,000 people in the U.S. have HIV, but are not aware of it. 

HIV counseling and testing is an essential component of public health efforts to reduce HIV incidence and to increase access to HIV care, treatment and support.  Currently, PSI provides counseling and testing services in 21 countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America & the Caribbean.  As one of the first international NGOs to social market counseling and testing PSI's CT sites are linked by common brands which are positioned as symbols of hope and quality to help create awareness and generate demand for testing.  In addition to branded advertising, PSI uses non-branded BCC campaigns to motivate people to learn their HIV status.  Culturally appropriate, targeted mass media and interpersonal communication strategies also aim to reduce stigma associated with HIV testing.

These social marketing efforts have been effective in creating national dialogues on the importance of testing and in inspiring people to test.  PSI has tested over 1.6 million people globally.  So, in the spirit of National HIV Testing Day, I leave you with a few interesting examples of PSI's counseling and testing social marketing efforts.

Saying “I do” to testing

In an effortto stop the spread of HIV within marriage, couples wishing to marry in Saudi Arabia will soon have to be tested for both HIV and HCV in one of more than 20 centers across the kindom, AFP/Yahoo News! reports.  While it may be feasible to enact such a policy, there are still key ethical issues to take into consideration: what happens if someone tests positive?  Are they forced to disclose to their future spouse?  Are they still "allowed" to get married under Saudi law?  Or, will the adoption of such a policy help normalize HIV testing and increase linkages to care and support services when necessary.

In Zimbabwe, both faith-based organizationsand development agencies have tried to leverage marriage as an opportunity to promote HIV counseling and testing.  Because Zimbabwe outlaws mandatory HIV testing, a formal initiative was never launched, however the practice is promoted informally in certain communities including a part of Manicaland Province where young men and women must obtain a "certificate of fitness" which includes an HIV test before marriage. 

PSI/Zimbabwe has also tackled this issue by producing radio and television spots that encourage premarital testing as a part of promotional campaigns for its New Start counseling and testing centers.