BY BRENNA MATENDERE
THE National Aids Council is preparing to scale down new HIV infections on young and adolescent girls in Hurungwe who follow the money during the coming period of intense activity driven by tobacco rush.
In coming few weeks, farmers in the area will rush to tobacco auction floors to sell the golden crop but history shows when they do that, it results in trappings of young and adolescent girls who follow the money.
The young girls co-habit with elderly farmers whose buying power will be immense and, in the process, indulge in unprotected sex that can translate into a spike of new HIV infections.
The situations lead to HIV drivers like early marriages, and teenage pregnancies among the young girls.
Hurungwe District AIDS Coordinator, Admire Takawira, confirmed to The NewsHawks that indeed many young girls in the area are lured into relationships with older tobacco farmers, exposing them to unprotected sex that cause sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
“Hurungwe is widely known for its tobacco farming activities. The availability of disposable income during the selling season makes young girls particularly vulnerable. Older men often target them, luring them into sexual relationships, sometimes without protection,” Takawira said.
In order to tame the scourge, he said Nac has started a programme that has been educating girls about these dangers way before the tobacco selling season begins.
Known as Sista to Sista, the programme educates adolescent girls on proper sexual and reproductive health mostly on cases where there has been parental negligence and peer pressure on them.
The program also covers more topics on HIV, family planning, and has recently expanded to include discussions on non-communicable diseases, drug and substance abuse.
The programme is set up in a way such that there is a mentor trained by Nac who takes up groups of about 25 girls each to teach them on these topics.
Charity Choruwa, a Sista 2 Sista mentor from Vhareta Village, Ward 24 in Chiroti, Hurungwe district, said one of the programme’s successes has been to tame intergenerational relationships during tobacco rush that has been a major driver of STIs in the district such as HIV.
“Many girls prioritize financial stability over their well-being. When an older man offers to support their lifestyle, they are quick to accept, especially during the tobacco selling season. This has led to an increase in cases of teenage marriages, gender-based violence, and economic exploitation.
“So our Sista to Sista programme is handling these problems by teaching the girls best ways of avoiding all those things. We have lessons twice a week to teach the girls on how best to avoid falling into these problems,” she said.
She added that the progamme also teaches the girls to handle abuse from their spouses, who often sell all their tobacco and return home without any money, leading to domestic conflicts and financial instability.
“We teach them to start self help projects that empower them so that they are not too reliant on tobacco income,” she said.
Statistics from 2024 shows that Hurungwe district recorded 4,289 cases of STIs, while 62 primary school girls were married and 79 became pregnant.
Among secondary school girls, 215 were married, and 170 fell pregnant. These figures show increased HIV risk for the young girls and the Nac programme is working to scale them down this year.
The district also has an HIV incidence rate of 0.06 percent, with 3,427 people living with HIV.
