Downpour no dampener for youths spreading hope on World AIDS Day
Tantri Yuliandini, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
The rain is unrelenting as some 500 teenagers from across the city huddle under the tarpaulin roofs of the organizers' tents in front of the Proclamation Monument in Central Jakarta for World AIDS Day.
Vitha and Ririe -- grade 11 students of State High School No. 12 in Klender, East Jakarta -- attended the event on Thursday to lend their support to the youth declaration that was supposed to be read out.
The weather it seems, makes no concessions for a good cause, but at least one part of the White Band Campaign was successful.
Just before the downpour, some 50 junior and senior high school students distributed hundreds of HIV/AIDS fact sheets and red ribbons to drivers in the vicinity of the Hotel Indonesia traffic circle.
Activists from various NGOs and employees of Standard Chartered Bank -- which supported the event -- also lent a hand, holding up the 350-meter "white band" surrounding the fountain in the center of the traffic circle.
"It's such a shame about the rain, we're here because we are members of the youth red cross, but also because we're interested in learning about AIDS," Ririe, 15, who can recite the textbook definition of AIDS, said.
The event at the Proclamation Monument, however, was canceled due to the bad weather.
Organized by a national coalition comprising the Ministry of Education, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), as well as non-governmental organizations Plan Indonesia, Indonesian Humanitarian Committee (KKI), the Jakarta chapter of Indonesian Planned Parenthood Association (PKBI) and the Indonesian Aids Foundation (YAI), this year's White Band campaign in Indonesia bears the theme "Our Rights, Our Hope".
"It's a pledge for equality, acknowledging the effects of stigma toward children with HIV/AIDS, and rejecting discrimination," Plan Indonesia's national health specialist Wahdini Hakim said.
The campaign focuses on junior and high school students in the hope of creating awareness among teenagers before they are sexually active.
"We know that children begin injecting at junior high school age, and the majority of new infections from intravenous drug use (IDU) are among people between the ages of 15 to 24," UNESCO representative for Indonesia Steven Hill said, explaining that a large number of people within this age range had little or no knowledge on HIV/AIDS or how it is transmitted.
One estimation of the number of people living with HIV/AIDS in the country is between 90,000 to 130,000, though some local experts put the figure at between 180,000 and 250,000.
Government data shows there are at least 600,000 IDUs in the country, half of whom are believed to be HIV-positive.
Wahdini, one of the organizers of this year's White Band Campaign said the campaign would be organized annually, and, in the meantime, the national coalition would create programs and form collaborations to stem the AIDS crisis in the country.
"Do not believe that, just because you don't want it to happen, HIV/AIDS will go away. It won't, unless you take action," Hill said.