an Eldis Resource

This paper, commissioned for UNESCO, outlines the Stepping Stones training package which aims to enable discussion on difficult but important issues in HIV prevention. Although Information, Education and Communication (IEC) approaches to HIV prevention have helped people learn about difficult issues, such as sex, death and gender, they have not been successful in stimulating discussion and action.

The paper briefly charts the IEC response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and their drawbacks, before outlining the Stepping Stones approach. The author argues that this approach is more holistic in recognising the location of HIV in a broader sexual and reproductive health (SRH) context. It emphasises the importance of a gendered perspective throughout and works on the basis that, with good facilitation, ordinary community members are those most able to develop the best solutions for their own sexual health needs. This approach can help to challenge conventional attitudes about women’s rights, traditional gender roles and allow women to meet their own sexual and reproductive health needs. Removing the taboo from these issues will help alleviate the causes and consequences of gender conflict, and by extension, vulnerability to HIV transmission. [adapted from author].

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