As the world paces towards the global set target to eliminate HIV/AIDS by 2030, the role played by Mildmay Uganda can’t be underestimated.

Through the Determined, Resilient, Empowered, AIDs Free, Mentored and Safe (DREAMS) project, Mildmay has prioritised skilling girls to earn a living given the fact that many young girls have ended up into promiscuity to secure a living.

DREAMS has contributed to the reduction in the incidence of new HIV cases among vulnerable AGYW by bringing together evidence-based approaches addressing structural drivers that increase girls’ and young women’s HIV risk. These include poverty, lack of education and lack of meaningful interactions.

The program provides interventions focused on building three types of assets: Human, Social and Economic. These include access to behaviour change communication, life skills training, Peer-led mobilisation, and engagement, parenting skills, HIV testing services, Post-Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP), condom promotion and provision, linkage to family planning services, PrEP, Antiretroviral therapy (ART) and Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision for their partners. Social and economic interventions include community mobilisation for norms change & Gender Based Violence(GBV) prevention, and post-violence care services; male partner engagement, peer support groups, financial literacy, market-led vocational training, and creation of saving groups.

The Village Savings and Loan Association (VSLA) groups have empowered the Adolescent Girls and Young Women (AGYW) to plan and save, which has increased their economic resilience. In addition to training in the traditional female trades, AGYW have been able to train in male dominated skills like mechanics, electric installation and are able to obtain gainful employment.

GIRLS GRADUATE AFTER ATTENDING THE DREAMS PROGRAM
Since 2016, Mildmay Uganda with support from the Presidential Emergency Plan for AIDs Relief (PEPFAR) through the Center for Diseases Control (CDC) has so far trained and mentored over 178,336 adolescent girls and young women through the Determined, Resilient, Empowered, AIDs Free, Mentored and Safe (DREAMS) project.

Joyce Namugambe

“Our priority is to ensure that young girls are not exposed to HIV infection and to help those who are already infected to support themselves access treatment so that they remain healthy,” Joyce Namugambe, the Dreams project officer said.
She added; “We work with girls between the ages of 10 and 25 years to reduce the risk of spreading of HIV.

We teach them skills to help them earn a living so that they are not exposed to the possibility of being infected.”
The children most at risk according to Mildmay, include those from poor backgrounds and those not going to school.
The project that started eight years ago, currently covers the four districts of central Uganda, namely; Mityana, Kassanda, Luweero and Mubende.
The beneficiaries, according to Namugambe, are selected through different ways, the priority being those with the utmost risk of being infected due to the circumstances at their disposal.

“We prioritise them over others. We do screening before we start training them with different hands-on skills,” she said.
She added; “We empower them through vocational skills so that they do not end up in situations that expose them to HIV infection. It benefits us when they learn what they can do with their lives to earn money because they learn to survive without relying on another person. They become courageous and can advocate for themselves in relationships without being tempted or lured by financial gains.”

To identify and select the beneficiaries, Namugambe said they work with the government authorities in the districts where they operate.
“We involve the police if there is a child experiencing abuse. We also use social workers to send us these children,” she said.
According to Namugambe, they also work with different organisations to skill the girls.
“We are most proud of the training that has given children information that some had never heard of, they did not know certain things someone does to them that is abuse or where they could go for assistance.

Many did not know how to protect themselves from HIV. But they have now acquired skills they can use,” she said.
Everything, according to Namugambe, is offered to the girls for free in safe spaces, their role is just to attend training sessions.

“Those with children, learn with them because when we receive these girls most of them are pregnant. Others had early pregnancies.

And because the classes are sometimes lengthy, we created space for them to care for their children as they study. We let them study with the babies so that they have peace of mind,” he said.

She said that sometimes they take training to the specific areas for training instead of the girls coming in the safe spaces.
“When they finish learning, we release them and give them the tools they need to use in doing what they have learnt and also help them to find a market so that their business succeeds and they can support themselves. Since we work with district leaders, they know these girls. They (district leaders) also have their own registered groups that these girls are added to. Even if we leave, they will continue receiving help.”

She said that they created a district council and a DREAMS steering committee, to among others, help in identifying challenges the girls encounter and report accordingly.
From the four districts, Namugambe said they receive about 50,000 girls every year.
Jane Yiga, an Executive Director at Nakaseeta Initiative for Adult Education and Development (NIFAED) said they collaborate with Mildmay on the DREAMS Project.
“We support them to implement their work.

We prepare these children by teaching them skills to empower them to avoid getting infected with HIV,” she said.
She admitted that earning a living has really put the girls at risk which demands for utmost support to secure them 

“Even the young men who fry chapati deceive them; they give them chapati, Rolex, a bottle of soda and then sleep with them. Yet when these girls get pregnant, they deny responsibility sometimes after they have infected them with HIV.

But when they learn what they can make and sell to get money, they are less desperate because they can get some things by themselves,” she said.
She teaches the girls how to weave baskets which they sell at more than sh5000 and cater for their needs.

According to Faridah Nazziwa, the senior probation officer Mityana district, the DREAMS project has tremendously boosted their efforts to safeguard the girl child. She noted that children suffer the brunt in case of challenges in homes with many dropping out of school on top of being relieved of parental support which leaves them wondering.

Faridah Nazziwa

“I thank Mildmay Uganda for creating the DREAMS project which has helped us with those children because children from 15 years and above would have been in early marriages. They train children in various things depending on their age.
Even if the DREAMS project closes, we can look for these girls in the villages and add them to existing government programs so that they can continue progressing. We have ways in which they can be helped,” she said.