Knysna Aids Council - Why and How to Help

WHY and HOW to HELP?

OUR BUDGET

Knysna Aids Council has come a long way since opening its doors in 1994 but there is still so much to achieve and we need help and support to enable us to accomplish our objectives. KAC works on a small budget which comes mainly from local government - Knysna Municipality - and international sponsors.

The funds we receive from Knysna Municipality helps the Council to cover basic administration costs (phone bills, electricity, etc.) and the employee's minimal salaries. Our general budget does not allow the organization much freedom to spend money and we rely strongly upon the generosity of the general public, businesses and organisations. The funds we receive from international sponsors go directly to the projects we support and to community members affected by HIV and AIDS. This helps to pay for school fees, supplies and uniforms for children affected by HIV. Some donations also come in the form of food and clothing, which are distributed to individuals, families and crèches affected by HIV/ AIDS in the greater Knysna area.

WHAT WE NEED TO ACHIEVE

As we have a limited budget, one of the tasks set by Knysna Aids Council is to secure new sources of funding. However, a major goal for the next years to come will be to increase awareness. AIDS is a not necessarily a fatal disease, but a chronic one that can often be treated with anti-retroviral drugs. Many people still live with strong misconceptions about HIV and AIDS.

We need to work on raising general awareness about HIV and AIDS and battle against these misconceptions. The community needs to acknowledge that HIV and AIDS can affect and infect each and everyone.

Another major priority will be children who have been infected or affected by the epidemic. We have been working very closely with Nombulelo Fanti to bring in funds for her afternoon care centre. Most of these children need her care due to the fact that their mothers are HIV positive and are often too weak to take care of their children. The care centre and its children has been blessed over the years with help from local and international sponsors but what is urgent to organise is a constant support from donors. For example, the children need new school uniforms each year. They also need funds to pay for their school fees. Nombulelo's house also needs some renovation as there is neither a kitchen nor bathroom. More...

Madgaleentjie's Pre-Primary school also needs more funds to support the children who are all either affected or infected by/with HIV/AIDS. The children at the school have also benefited from a group of British, German and American sponsors whose personal donations and fund-raising activities overseas are ensuring that they have uniforms,
school supplies, toys and hot meals, and that their school fees are paid. More...

Funds have indeed been coming in, but there is still so much to achieve in order to give these children a decent life. One of the goals for this year is to organise an "Adopt a Child" campaign, where individuals can help out one child and cover all his/her needs by donating R100 per month.

One important goal is also to expand the Knysna Aids Council as a Community Centre. The current office space has been kindly donated by the Roman Catholic Church of Knysna, offering room for a kitchen, nurse's office, a lounge, offices for counsellors and the director, a training room and a resource centre which now has computers which have been donated to us by Bishop Donald Harker of the Anglican Church. We want to establish a form of membership through the Knysna Aids Council for people living with HIV and AIDS and their affected families and friends. This will allow us to utilize the office space as a community centre that would provide much needed support and foster a strong sense of community.

Knysna Aids Council also needs to reach out to more people and further advertise our services. We now have a quarterly newsletter which is kindly sponsored and distributed by Actions Ads in Knysna. We have also used local newspapers and publications to advertise our free HIV testing and counselling services but we still need to develop our advertising campaign in order to get through to the whole greater Knysna community. Businesses need to understand that a small fee needs to be paid for the outreaches in their work place. KAC is an NGO, and does not generate income therefore we are in need of funds to be able to meet our administrative costs such as paying the counsellors who carry out the outreach programmes.

Last but not least, Knysna Aids Council is hoping to raise funds to be able to employ a permanent social worker who would be based on our premises.

HOW TO HELP US

Outlined below are various areas where the Council needs urgent help for. If you wish to support any of these projects and help us to move forward, please contact us on
+27 (0)44-382-0989 or write to us here.

Children's Projects

Nombulelo's Care Centre
Nombulelo's amazing work has benefited from the generosity of various donors but there are still many areas where help is needed. First of all, funds are needed in order to build a proper kitchen in the house, and also a bathroom.

Nombulelo welcomes about 45 children everyday, feeds them and looks after them by organising drama and music activities, etc. It is obvious that she needs an even better infrastructure for her care centre, such as a good kitchen. Furthermore, everyone needs a salary to survive, and Nombulelo now works part time at the Council and in the afternoons, she looks after these children on her own, without receiving any kind of salary. The Council feels the centre would benefit greatly from extra staff who could help Nombulelo with her various tasks and play with the children. Nombulelo's works on her own because there is not enough funding to cover for someone's salary. Last but not least, these children have benefited greatly from the generosity of various individual donors, such as Mike Syme's monthly donation of food, toiletries, dental care supplies, etc. However, there is a constant need for more help, as many of these children's family do not have the money to pay for the school fees and uniforms. Every child also has the right to play, and the care centre would greatly benefit from donations of toys, drawing books, colour pencils or general stationery. And of course, there is always a need for basic supplies of food, toiletries, etc. More...

Madgaleentjie's Pre-Primary school
The school is receiving donations from international sponsors and children are benefiting greatly from this as it pays for their school fees, supplies and uniforms, and also for some food and toys. But these funds will not last and we need to organise more help in order to provide these children with all their basic needs. More...

Sophie's
This is a very similar project to Nombulelo's after-school care centre. It is situated in the Sedgefield area and welcomes about 80 children everyday. These children are either affected of infected by/with HIV/AIDS and are benefiting from this project where they receive meals and some affection. Sophie's project is however very under-funded and it is urgent we provide these children with food, basic medical kits, dental care, toiletries (deodorant, shampoos, etc), clothes, school uniforms, school fees, stationery, toys, etc. More...

Transportation

For a number of years, Knysna Aids Council has been attempting to acquire a vehicle for the provision of services. This would allow us to easily deliver food and various supplies to the people in need within the community, such as the care centre, crèche, etc.

We are organising many awareness and prevention campaigns across the region and Knysna Aids Council has had to use the Director's personal vehicle to bring the staff to different locations (schools, prisons, shops, etc.). Most of the time, this also means two journeys, as staff and material for awareness campaigns do not always fit in one car. For logistics and costing reasons, a vehicle is essential for an organisation such as us whose role is to reach out to people physically.

The need for a car/minibus has also increased tremendously since we started our free non-medical HIV testing (in August 2006) and counselling. Our wish and goal for this year is to reach out to a maximum of people in the greater Knysna area but it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to do so without our own transportation. For example one of the group of individuals we want to reach out to are the farmers. According to Knysna Municipality's statistics, the farmers in the greater Knysna area are very few to have been tested for HIV. Communities who do not have easy access to HIV testing sites such as clinics etc, will no get tested. With our own transportation, we will be able to set up a regular mobile testing site and reach out to more and more people.

A vehicle would also allow us to help Nombulelo's children on Mondays when some of them need to go to the clinic for ARV treatment. For the moment, Nombulelo accompanies them in a taxi but this is a difficult and expensive routine. With our own transportation, we will be able to pick up all the children and bring them to the ARV clinics for free.

Our idea to develop a Community Centre on the Council's premises has also been put on hold since people within the community do not have funds to pay for a taxi to come down to KAC's offices. A vehicle would allow us to pick people up at various places in Knysna and bring them to the centre to take part in the various activities we will organise.

Acquiring our own vehicle is an urgent and major issue for the Knysna Aids Council as it would help us tremendously in achieving our goals.

Mothers and Children

Knysna Aids Council supports a Mother to Child Transmission Programme and campaigns strongly to raise awareness regarding the many ways of minimizing the chances for HIV positive mothers to pass the virus on to their babies.

The MTCT programme is all about helping people to get the right medicine at the right time to make sure that more babies are not infected with HIV.

Research all over the world has shown that if a mother and her baby are able to take certain medication, there is a good chance that HIV will not be passed from mother to child if the mother has the HIV virus in her body during pregnancy.

The programme also helps mothers to decide on the best way to feed their babies. HIV can also be passed through breastfeeding and to lower the chance of this, it is recommended to use milk formula.

However, milk formula and baby bottles are expensive items and women in our community cannot always afford it. Furthermore, if a mother is feeding milk formula to her baby, this has to be done very carefully, on a regular basis, with clean water and the right dosage. This means that the need for baby bottles, milk formula and even clean water is constant.

Mothers and their children are in urgent need of baby bottles and milk formula. We have received some donations from businesses but we are currently also calling out to the general public and their generosity as these mothers are in constant need of bottles and milk to feed their babies.

Through this campaign, we will be able to help more mothers and children, and thus minimizing the chances of HIV to be passed on to babies, which means lowering the numbers of people infected and affected with HIV/AIDS. Knysna Aids Council will also become more visible and the more our work and efforts are recognized, the more we will be able to succeed in promoting prevention, raising awareness and fighting preconceptions about HIV and AIDS. More...

IF YOU WANT TO HELP IN ANY WAY, PLEASE CONTACT KNYSNA AIDS COUNCIL BY TELEPHONE +27 (0)44-382-0989, EMAIL
OR JUST COME AND VISIT US AT MELROSE HOUSE IN KNYSNA