Problems associated with AIDS : response by the Government to the Third report from the Social Services Committee session 1986-87 / presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Social Services by command of Her Majesty January 1988.

  • Great Britain. Department of Health and Social Security.
Date:
1988
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: Problems associated with AIDS : response by the Government to the Third report from the Social Services Committee session 1986-87 / presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Social Services by command of Her Majesty January 1988. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    We recommend that if the Government is not prepared to be as explicit as may be necessary in the information targeted at specific groups (and we understand why this might be so), it should devolve the work those who are. 3.7 The first phase of the campaign was intended to raise the general level of public awareness about AIDS and to increase general knowledge of the ways in which HIV infection is and is not transmitted. Market research commissioned to evaluate the campaign suggests that it has been largely successful in meeting these objectives. For the future, the strategy will be to maintain and reinforce levels of knowledge about AIDS amongst the general population and to translate this knowledge into action by encouraging attitudinal and behavioural change amongst those whose behaviour puts them most at risk. This will require material that is more precisely targeted. In September 1987 the Government launched the second stage of the campaign which focuses on the need to warn young people against injecting drugs because of the risk of infection through shared needles and syringes. At the same time, the third phase of the drug prevention campaign was launched to complement the anti-injecting message. This stage of the AIDS campaign was not activley promoted in Northern Ireland in view of the very low incidence of injecting drug misuse in the Province. 3.8 Further stages of the campaign will be carried forward by the Health Education Authority, in close collaboration with the Scottish Health Education Group, the Welsh Health Promotion Authority and relevant Government Departments, and in the light of research. In addition, the encouragement of local education initiatives is envisaged, involving the participation of both statutory and voluntary bodies. Such initiatives will take account of the specific needs of local communities. 3.9 The Committee’s view of the need to ensure that AIDS information is presented in ways acceptable and relevant to the target audience is shared by the Government, particularly where the objective is to effect behavioural change. Any reinforcement of feelings of alienation or stigma could lessen the impact of the campaign and, in this respect, researching and piloting of material to be used are most important. often best put across by bodies active in particular fields, eg among the homosexual community or representing disabled or sensorily impaired people, or those from ethnic minority communities. Their advice in presenting and putting out messages about AIDS to these groups is greatly valued. We further recommend that the general campaign should be geared more towards those who do not read pamphlets or newspapers. 3.11 The Government accepts the need to ensure that all sections of the population have access to information about AIDS in an appropriate form. Funding has been provided for visual and audio material for the visually and aurally impaired, and material for people with reading and learning difficulties will be produced. Action has also been taken to produce material relevant and acceptable to ethnic minorities, including the establishment of a dial and listen service in the main languages of the Indian sub-continent and Cantonese. This service came in to operation in November 1987. The continued funding of the National AIDS Helpline provides telephone access to information and advice. We conclude that the wisest approach is to advocate celibacy before marriage and fidelity within it as the ideal, but to accept that people may find this hard to achieve. Recommendation 32 ‘*Safe sex’’ is now an inescapable personal responsibility.