Programs
Awareness & Education
We are aiming to create awareness and educate the community on drug abuse and HIV&AIDS. The most important component of this program is an HIV prevention program. The objective is to reduce risk behavior and increase safe practice among out of school youths and adolescence in relation to drug use and HIV&AIDS.
We try to reach the adolescents that are most at risk, such as drug users, sex workers, men having sex with men and street children. Forty peer educators are mobilized to educate most at risk youths and adolescents about life skills. Also counseling services are offered. Furthermore linkages and referral with other services and organizations have been established and pediatric support and prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) is included in this program.
The program is carried out in the following urban areas of Sunsari district: Dharan, Itahari, Inaruwa, Duhabi, Jhumka and Pakali.
Drug Treatment & Social Integration
For this program KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra managed to establish its own rehabilitation centre in Dharan. In this 40 beds are available for people to join in the rehabilitation program. The success rate of rehabilitation is around 70%. Also family of the person receiving treatment is involved in the program to make social integration a success.
In the rehabilitation centre also counseling services are offered. Furthermore a support group is set-up for recovered drug users and in order to make integration into society easier, trainings, such as computer skills, are offered. Drug treatment in the rehabilitation centre is free for people who can not afford the fee. Besides this rehabilitation centre KYC-PJK is currently taking action to set-up another rehabilitation centre that specifically aims to rehabilitate and reintegrate female IDUs.
Harm Reduction
The harm reduction program aims to stop the transmission of HIV&AIDS among injecting drug users and to create an enabling environment for the harm reduction program. To accomplish this, KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra runs a street based outreach program and Drop-in centers (DIC).
As part of the harm reduction program, KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra furthermore provides needle and syringe exchange services, counseling, BCC education, minor primary healthcare services, IEC materials and various referral services to IDUs.
Furthermore Oral drug Substitution Therapy (OST) will be offered soon in order to make the Harm reduction program more comprehensive.
Advocacy
KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra has been involved in rights based advocacy since its establishment from 1996. It focuses especially on the rights of drug users and people living with HIV and AIDS. This is both on a national and local level. The advocacy activities aim to tackle stigma and discrimination and change policies and structures.
This is done in a joint effort with beneficiaries, stakeholders, the community and GOs. Continuation of advocacy helps to change policy and structures. In order to create a strong and unified response an advocacy task force is formed together with other NGOs.
The advocacy work of KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra has resulted in the establishment of an enabling and supporting environment for drug users for positive living in Dharan, the police has started to refer drug users for treatment from their custody, drug treatment was started with support from Dharan municipality, an ART and PMTCT center has been established in Dharan, a healthy and friendly environment for drug user and PLHA has been established at BPKIHS (teaching hospital of Dharan), a separate counseling unit has been established at BPKIHS, Dharan Municipality, Damak municipality, Itahari municipality and DDC Sunsari started to allocate budget for Drug and HIV&AIDS prevention annually, Dharan municipality started to allocate budget for medical treatment support for poor PLHA.
HIV Care & Support
KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra currently is running a care home for PLHA. The centre has a capacity of 20 people for both male and female PLHAs. In the care home PLHAs receive care and support if they are ill and when receiving ART from the hospital. Also counseling services are offered here. Also outreach and refferal services are offered and KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra will be doing PMTCT follow-up for its clients as well.
In order to extend the reach of this program an information, refferal and counseling centre is set-up in Lahan to cover the districts of Siraha and Saptari. Furthermore we are currently looking into opportunities to set-up a similar centre in Udaipur district.
From 2009 KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra will also run a Community Home Based Care program.
Sexual and Reproductive Health
The objective is to improve sexual and reproductive health of marginalized and disadvantaged communities. This includes teaching families about safe-sex practices and birth control. Furthermore, literacy classes contribute to help marginalized women to become better educated and improve access to sexual and reproductive health services.
VCT / STI / PHC
In Dharan and Itahari KYC-Punarjiwan Kendra is currently offering Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) services. Furthermore tests and advice can be sought here regarding Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI). Besides these services also Primary Health Care (PHC) is offered to the community.
