The Role Of Voluntary Youth in HIV/AIDS Prevention : HIV/AIDS Prevention and Youth Volunteerism

AIDS is the leading killer among the sexually active section of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa. Ethiopia is also one of the countries with high prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Lack of awareness and misconceptions contributed to high risk behavior that lead to the spread of HIV/AIDS. While young people are among the most vulnerable groups to HIV infection, they are also the most promising agents of behavior change. If behavior change is to be effective, it should involve the youth itself in the generation of appropriate messages. Four hundred and twenty two voluntary youth were selected systematically from the list of 40 youth groups working in HIV/AIDS prevention, care and support in the 10 sub-cities of Addis Ababa. A structured and pre-tested self administered questionnaire was used for data collection. The result showed that 76.0% of the voluntary youth in HIV/AIDS prevention care and support were active in peer/public education; 45.3% of them were involved in condom distribution and 45.0% were involved in home based care and support. The majority of the respondents (84.8%) indicated that NGOs were supporting their activities, 34.6% said that governmental organizations were supp