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According to the latest HIV estimates, there are 5.5 million South Africans (or one in nine) living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). With the availability of anti-retroviral drugs, this number will grow and the need to direct interventions to prevent further infections towards PLWHA has become a public health imperative. The 2005 South African national household survey on HIV Prevalence, Incidence, Behaviour and Communication found that half of HIV-positive respondents did not consider themselves at risk of acquiring HIV. In groundbreaking HSRC research on positive prevention, preliminary findings on risk behaviour among PLWHAs found that: Of the 85% participants who were sexually active, 42% indicated that they had sex in the previous three-month period without disclosing their status to their partners. Participants who had not disclosed to all of their sex partners were significantly more likely to have multiple sex partners, HIV negative partners, or partners whose HIV status was unknown. In a seminar at the HSRC under the World AIDS Campaign theme of Stop AIDS: Keep the promise, Professor Leickness Simbayi, a research director in the Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS and Health programme, will share some of the findings of the study taking place in the Western Cape. The focus of the seminar will be on the public health imperative of leading and living positively, and speakers will discuss approaches to, and preliminary findings of, positive prevention and research. This year, World AIDS Day also has significance for the HSRC since the organisation will be launching a corporate responsibility programme and staff in all three offices (Cape Town, Durban and Pretoria) will be contributing towards gifts for children infected and affected by the pandemic. These gifts will be handed to three institutions, namely the Lily of the Valley Village near Eston in KwaZulu-Natal, Khumbulani Home in Khayelitsha, and the Tapologo HIV and AIDS Programme in Rustenburg. This will be followed by a candle-lighting ceremony to commemorate those who have or who live with HIV / AIDS and those who have died.
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