A Study To Assess Knowledge And Attitude Of Adolescents Regarding Hiv/Aids Prevention A Study Of Lokopo Sub-County Napak-District

ABSTRACT

as part of the efforts to understand the level of knowledge and attitude regarding HIV/AIDS

prevention amongst Karamoja adolescents, a study was conducted to assess the knowledge and attitude of the Karamoja adolescents regarding HIV/AIDS prevention. A semi-structured interview was conducted with 34 respondents along with two focus group discussions and 5 key informants. Out of the 34 respondents, 1 7 were females and the other half were males.25 of the respondent indicated that they had never been at school and 1 5 were schooling. The study found that Majority of the adolescents in Karamoja had heard about HIV but knowledge about how it is transmitted and prevented is still incomplete amongst the adolescents. Majority of the respondents knew that HIV/AIDS is incurable and also knew that having sexual intercourse with an infected person and sharing of sharp instruments like razorbiade, and needles are the major causative agents of the disease. Many of the adolescents first heard about l-IIV from the media and the major sources of information regarding HIV prevention were radios, teachers, parents, and texts books. However, there are still some misconceptions about the transmittable routes of

IIV/AIDS. Theses misconceptions varied from gender and education levels. The common

fisconception amongst the schooling adolescents concerning the transmittable routes of HIV vere; kissing, mosquitoes bite and similar insects bites whereas amongst the non schooling adolescents the commonest misconception were; you can get HIV through washing clothes of an infected person, hand- shakes, sneezing, coughing and sharing food.

concerning the non-transmittable routes, the adolescents especially school going adolescents had correct knowledge that HIV can be prevented by using condoms, having sex with HIV negative single partner, avoiding an HIV infected person and AIDS education. Whereas non schooling adolescents especially females had incorrect knowledge about the prevention methods that HIV an be prevented by putting on shoes, washing clothes and not sharing clothes with n infected person. Knowledge about condoms was insufficient amongst the adolescents only few of the shooling adolescents knew about the condom and its use.