HIV AIDS Seminar in Galle 

26 April 2008 - It has strongly been felt that many Sri Lankan’s have long been silent about HIV/AIDS. Such silence and complacency is dangerous since HIV/AIDS does not respect any religion, cast, or culture. According to UNAIDS over 6000 persons suffer from HIV AIDS in Sri Lanka. Taking all these into consideration, as a step ahead, a project positive awareness seminar was organized in order to bring awareness amongst the Sunday school teachers and youth leaders about the HIV epidemic in the Galle district. 

This seminar was held at the Smyrna Church Galle on the 26th of April 2008. 59 participants representing 15 churches from the Galle district attended this seminar. Two facilitators spoke at this forum and all presentations were simple and easy to understand. The contents had in depth meaning. The topics that were covered were 

• What is HIV AIDS & how it spreads
• Myths & realities of the disease
• HIV AIDS in Sri Lanka
• Church responsibility towards eradicating HIV Aids
• Psychosocial support

At the end of each topic a group discussion was held and an appropriate movie clip was shown. This helped all participants to get a clear understanding on what the facilitators spoke about. Finally time was set apart for participants’ comments and for a question & answer session.  

This seminar made a great impact on the participants as they got the knowledge they never had before. It also gave them a great opportunity to share with their colleagues about this epidemic from which Sri Lanka would hopefully turn into a HIV AIDS risk free country.