BHASO Programme Components

BHASO uses one programme approach putting people living with HIV  at the center stage of its programming with various projects outlined below  complimenting each other to provide holistic support to the target communities:

BHASO Programme Components

Quite a number of complementary activities exist in the intended districts. These range from:

Food Security and Livelihood activities such as input distribution, nutrition gardens, conservation farming, small livestock farming and market linkages.(Masvingo and Gutu)

Health and Nutrition a health based food security and nutrition intervention aimed at providing nutritional support for People Living with HIV  through therapeutic feeding, it focuses on ensuring stable availability, access and utilization  of food by those on ART, pre-ART, TB, Maternal Child Health including both pregnant and lactating mothers in Masvingo urban and rural districts.

New life Post Test Support (free professional counseling to people living with HIV&AIDS including those on the Prevention of Parent to Child Transmission (PPTCT) Programme, workers at their workplaces, visiting prisons and those who come to Opportunistic Infections (OI) Clinics for ART. Nutrition counseling for positive living is also offered). Conduct group information sharing for positive living strategies, training individuals on 8 standardized sessions on positive living (Masvingo, Chivi and Gutu)

Support to Support Groups: BHASO facilitates the formation, training and coordination of support groups who are empowered with skills in leadership, basic counseling, basic home based care, project planning and management, nutrition, survival skills, treatment literacy and herbs. Trained Community HIV & AIDS Support Agents (CHASA) assist and monitor other HIV positive people who are on ART. Behavior change activities are carried out by support groups themselves through campaigns, IEC materials, and peer education. (Masvingo, Chivi, Gutu and Zaka)

Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children [OVC]; The Project offers psychosocial support to OVC while empowering them with survival and leadership skills in order to enable them to live positive and meaningful lives. Child Care Givers and teachers are trained in psychosocial support in order to equip them with skills that will enable them to properly care for children. The community is empowered to once more take up its traditional role of looking after its own children. (Masvingo, Chivi and Gutu)

Youth Empowerment for Behavior Change: The Youth Project empowers youths with leadership skills while creating an environment where they can take charge of their HIV&AIDS awareness and prevention activities towards behavior change. Youths are also involved in community projects, care of orphans and other vulnerable children and home based care. (Bikita, Masvingo, Chivi and Zaka)

Children’s ART Literacy: BHASO is offering training in paediatric ART literacy to care givers and children on ARV in order to enable children to take their medication properly and consistently. (Chivi, Bikita, Masvingo and Gutu)

Gender and Advocacy: People living with HIV&AIDS are trained in human rights and advocacy in order to equip them with skills that will enable them to advocate for their rights and services. Support group members from ward, district advocacy and provincial teams and are successfully advocating for issues that affect people living with HIV while communities and stakeholders are being sensitized on gender issues. Gender is mainstreamed in all programme activities. Male involvement is also encouraged in support groups. (Chivi, Bikita, Masvingo, Zaka and Gutu).