Volume 35, Numbers 1 and 2, March and September - Special Issue on
Women, HIV/AIDS and Human Rights Sponsored by UNESCO, New Delhi.

Communicating Sexual Health in Street Children: The Behavior Change Communication Model
Ravindra Kumar Vemula

Street children are vulnerable as a group because of their age, poverty and lack of knowledge and exposure to risk taking behaviour such as early sexual activities and forced sexual exploitation. This paper outlines the methodology of Behaviour Change Communication developed by an N.G.O to be used on the street children of Andhra Pradesh. Such communication seeks to dispel myths regarding sexual health and replaces it with practical and useful knowledge for self-protection against HIV infection. This paper outlines the tools of public communication developed with help from LINTAS to be used among the street children. It also provides some basic data on infection among street children and their level of knowledge from field based data. The point of view advocated is that prevention is better than cure and the best form of prevention regarding an infection such as HIV among poor and illiterate target group is to provide public information in a medium that would be well understood. There is for example a need to focus on the language used and the images transmitted. The expertise for such communication is based on diffusion research that is very well developed. The research is focused on tools and methods and no results have been discussed.

Key Words: Street children, Sexual health, Behavior Change Communication (BCC), Diffusion Research, Andhra Pradesh.

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