Here is one positive aspect of ASEAN membership.
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Breaking Down ‘Wall of Silence’ on HIV and Safe Sex in Burma
by Swe Zin Htaik
August 15, 2007
Nearly one in three sex workers in Burma were living with HIV in 2005, according to a UNAIDS report from 2006. The ruling junta’s National AIDS Program also admitted that in 2005, HIV prevalence among 15- to 24-year-olds was 2.2 percent. only in 2002 did the junta admit the existence of the epidemic in Burma.
In an interview with The Irrawaddy, the once well-known Burmese actress Swe Zin Htaik talks about her recent efforts to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS in Burma. She heads a mass media marketing campaign, in partnership with the international non-governmental organization Population Services International, to encourage condom use in the country as an essential means of preventing the spread of the virus.
Question: How many condoms have PSI already distributed in Burma since 1996?
Answer: PSI started distributing its own brand of condom [Aphaw] in 1996. That year, we distributed 2.6 million condoms. By 2005, the number of condoms distributed in the commercial, public and PSI social marketing sectors reached 42.8 million.
Q: Could you please explain these sectors briefly?
A: The commercial sector, in fact, has existed for years as a market of “hidden sales.” According to our social marketing strategy, we encourage the existing market to develop for the benefit of society. If condoms can be obtained for free, people might misuse them, throw them away or sell them to others. As a result, their importance can be devalued by the general public. That’s why PSI imports condoms and distributes them at a special “subsidized rate” in the market. We named our product “Aphaw” and used Burmese language on the packaging. But after 2000, we changed the packaging to English because we were worried that people wouldn’t value our product if it was made in Burma. We have often created new package designs to grab our customers’ attention.
Q: During more than a decade of condom distribution and HIV/AIDS awareness education in Burma, what social constraints have had an impact on your work?
A: As an actress known to many people, I have had many constraints. When I started a communications component in the PSI program in 1999, I had to talk about condom use and sex education. People looked at me and my works with curiosity. The government watched what I was doing and saying. The Ministry of Health perceived me as just an actress with no health training. Even my family told me not to do such a work, which they considered shameful. Nevertheless as a campaigner, I have continued my campaign despite encountering such social and cultural constraints. I have tried to push open the closed doors on this issue, and the doors have gradually begun to open. The communication campaign struggled under a “denial stage” until 2000. My first HIV series, called “Travelers of Happiness,” encountered a very disgusting reaction. only after Burma signed an agreement to start HIV/AIDS education and prevention at the Asean meeting in 2002 could we gradually proceed with our communications campaign.
Q: What other obstacles did you experience at the grassroots level as you started launching your communications campaign?
A: We use three types of media: interpersonal communication, print media and broadcasting. It was too difficult to do before 2000. We couldn’t talk about HIV/AIDS education through the state-owned television. Therefore, we approached the state radio and launched a radio series on HIV/AIDS education. After we had launched four series, we received a letter from a Buddhist monk complaining that it was not appropriate to broadcast about HIV and sex education through the state media. After that, we had to drop our program. That is the cultural constraint I experienced. Now, we have also five mobile movie tracks and can travel and advocate among the public by showing [HIV and sex education] movies, but we need to get prior approval from government authorities. Sometimes it takes one or two months to get permission, which is a constraint the foreign expatriates [from the organization] don’t like. However, as a social activist, I have to be patient about such constraints for the sake of the people.
Q: Can you talk about Burmese women’s attitudes regarding condom use?
A: We have to use a “peer approach” method among high risk groups and encourage people to talk to their peers. The National AIDS Program also adopted a guideline that condom use demonstrations must be conducted among people of the same; that is, women must discuss with women, and men with men. There are some who might be afraid to buy condoms, but the more deeply I become involved in this work, the more I realize that Burmese women’s awareness level is not so low.
Q: There are sex workers in Burma, as there are in other countries, but the conservative nature of Burmese society does not like to accept this reality and the industry is legally prohibited. What strategies do you think are needed for Burma to effectively educate its young people about sex?
A: In the period between 2000 and 2002, I was warned that there were no sex workers, gay or heterosexual, in Burma. No mention was made in all of my communication products even though commercial sex workers, or CSWs, and men selling sex to men, or MSM, were our targeted groups. Therefore, we launched peer education programs during that period of denial. We went to the nightclubs once a month as part of our HIV education and Aphaw promotion campaigns. We gradually built up networking among CSW and MSM, through which we selected some individuals as interpersonal communicators. Then, we opened drop-in centers and appointed them as peer educators. We have to treat them without discrimination. This is our organization’s rule. Now hundreds of people come to our drop-in centers monthly.
Q: Do you have any final thoughts on your work and your experiences?
A: When I produced my first campaign series, I was pressured not to appear in mass media. But I had to be patient and develop my scripts. I then launched fifteen series without difficulty in 2004. We must take the key and open the closed door of this issue instead of just standing and knocking.
http://www.irrawaddy.org/print_page.php?art_id=8247
