Documenting good practices at partner level

During the period 2006 – 2010, a regional HIV and AIDS advocacy programme was implemented in the sub Saharan African countries. In this respect, HelpAge and its partners undertook a number of activities under the thematic areas of HIV prevention to address the impact of AIDS on older people. Consequently, strategies which were felt to be having an impact, and lessons learned have been highlighted and documented in this paper.

Main recommendations drawn from several case studies in six sub Saharan African countries can be summarised as follows:

• the governments should have a special programme in which older people can be supported, especially those living with HIV 
• there should be ongoing training on awareness about HIV and AIDS to older people including provision of grants
• there should be ongoing training of older home based care (HBC) providers, so that majority of older people can access knowledge and skills on how to care for people living with HIV and AIDS
• likewise, continuum and sustainable psychosocial support are essential to older carers and those under their care
• the capacity of older persons’ groups on ageing issues should be built to enable them to better organise and facilitate actions aimed at improving their welfare 
• the amount of resources available for borrowing should be increased to allow re-capitalisation of older persons’ income generating activities (IGAs)
  

In addition, the authors recommend documenting useful practice and disseminating them to all organisations, both government and NGOs and CSOs, who want to work on it and support older people.