At the end of 2007, an estimated 230,000 people were living with HIV in the Caribbean. Approximately 20,000 people were newly infected during 2007, and there were 14,000 deaths due to AIDS. Higher prevalence rates are found only in sub-Saharan Africa, making the Caribbean the second-most affected region in the world. Approximately 80% of all HIV cases in the Caribbean are reported on the island of Hispaniola: home to the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

 
In 2005 the German Financial Cooperation and PANCAP developed a Caribbean Social Marketing Project (CARISMA) to increase preventative behaviour by individuals using social marketing, as well as through the dynamism of the private and public sectors. The CARISMA project was managed by Options.

In the first phase of the CARISMA project (2005–2008) five successful social marketing programs (Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Belize and regional activities in ten Eastern Caribbean States) received financial and technical support. Funds were used to support expanded social marketing operations, address critical funding gaps and generate high-quality research. This research data has provided social marketers with vital information to make sound programmatic decisions and to design a follow-on project starting in 2009.

The first phase of the CARISMA project produced promising results. In the Eastern Caribbean an innovative behaviour change campaign "Got it? Get it" is targeting the most high-risk sexually active sector of the population with a mass media campaign for TV, radio and print media, which highlights the risks of having sex without using a condom. Following its success in the Eastern Caribbean, the Got It? Get It campaign was replicated in Belize. In the Dominican Republic a mini soap opera-series, "Amor de Batey", aimed at marginalised migrant populations (mainly Haitian), was aired on a national TV station, to highlight risky sexual behaviour that can lead to HIV and promote consistent condom use.

The HIV & AIDS prevention strategies initiated in CARISMA’s first phase is continuing and in some cases has expanded in the second phase. Phase 2 of the CARISMA project has broadened its focus to meet the need for targeted anti stigma and discrimination campaigns as well as family planning initiatives that support increased sexual health and reproductive rights.

The CARISMA Project for HIV & AIDS Prevention and Reproductive Health Promotion is a development programme of the Caribbean Community Secretariat (CARICOM) which is financed by the Federal Republic of Germany through the German Development Bank (KfW).

 

To learn more about CARISMA, visit the website at www.carisma-pancap.org  or contact Piya Shome This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .