A new report, ‘Prevent and protect: Linking the HIV and child protection response to keep children safe, healthy & resilient promising practices: building on experience from Nigeria, Zambia and Zimbabwe’, has been published by UNICEF and World Vision International. The report documents country level approaches that respond to HIV and child protection challenges facing children and adolescents by linking both those responses.
The report provides practical examples from Nigeria, Zambia and Zimbabwe of how both government and civil society organisations are linking child protection interventions to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support, resulting in improved impacts on both HIV outcomes and decrease in child abuse, violence, exploitation and neglect.
The report describes a wide-ranging set of approaches including community-based projects as well as government coordination mechanisms, working in both HIV and child protection. The examples include programmes where HIV-positive adolescents and young people are training health workers across the country, the use of social media and ICT technologies to identify and refer cases of HIV, abuse, violence or neglect and mechanisms that provide critical referrals between the social welfare and health sectors.