HIV/AIDS Prevention

The Katoke Trust, with support from the Sydney Archbishop’s Fund, Overseas Relief Aid Fund (ORAF), has been running an education campaign for the last eight years on AIDS prevention.

Malaria Prevention

This forms an integral part of the Katoke Trust’s multi-pronged attack on poverty, complementing the work done on education and agriculture. In Sub-Saharan Africa, two children younger than five years of age die from malaria every minute. Malaria is also a killer of all other age groups, and is especially a problem for pregnant women.

Insecticide-treated bed-nets (ITNs) are the most cost-effective means of malaria prevention (World Health Organization). ORAF and the Australian Government’s AusAID, in partnership with the Katoke Trust have introduced preventative education with subsidised bed-nets to the people around Katoke.

Prior to this intervention, which started in late 2002, the people of the Katoke area had little access to ITNs, with less than 1% of all villagers reporting that they always slept under a bed-net.

By January 2007, the rate of net use in our initial pilot project in Buhaya Village (2000 people) had risen to more than 96% of people reporting always using an ITN. Similar figures have been reported in the nearby villages when the project was extended to cover these.

This has resulted in the malaria rate falling dramatically. Initially 62% of villagers reported at least one episode of malaria per year, which fell to only 18% of villagers reporting incidents of malaria following this program.