Saleh Fareed

Saudi Gazette

 

JEDDAH — The Saudi Ministry of Health launched on Saturday an AIDS awareness campaign for teachers across the Kingdom’s major cities amidst efforts to create awareness about the disease.



Speaking of this new initiative, Dr. Ziad Memish, Deputy Minister for Public Health, revealed that the aim of such awareness programs is to eradicate social stigmas associated with the disease and to lay myths to rest surrounding the HIV virus that leads to AIDS, in addition to striving for an AIDS-free generation. He said that the Health Ministry is effectively engaged in awareness campaigns to successfully combat the disease.



“The first phase of the program targeted 500 teachers from Riyadh, Makkah, Jeddah, Madinah, Abha and Jazan to educate them and raise their awareness about the epidemic. The program was conducted in cooperation with the Ministry of Education,” he said.



He noted that providing young students from elementary, high school and even college with basic AIDS education enables them to protect themselves from becoming infected.



He added: “Schools play a pivotal role in providing AIDS education for young people and school students are particularly receptive to learning new information. Therefore schools are a well-established point of contact through which young people can receive AIDS education.”



Dr. Memish stated that the program comes as a continuation of previous efforts of the ministry to combat AIDS in Saudi Arabia and urges other sectors to follow the Ministry of Education in spreading the message of AIDS.