The “First Things First” campaign has officially been launched at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Westville campus today.
All five UKZN campuses are expected to participate in the mass voluntary HIV Counselling and Testing campaign.
Organisers are hoping to get 4 000 students tested between Monday and Thursday next week.
Val Beaumont – from Innovative Medicines South Africa – says they plan to test 35 000 students nationally.
“We identified the student group as a very vulnerable group. We know that when they go to university the parental controls aren’t there and there’s a lot of freedom. We see alcohol and drugs coming into the picture and we also see fairly risky sexual behaviour taking place, so it becomes a huge opportunity to educate them and to help them to be responsible around the whole subject,” she said.
