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CANADA: ABORIGINAL YOUTH RESILIENCE TO HIV/AIDS (ACRA), 1998-PRESENT |
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A quarter century of HIV/AIDS research suggests that communities cut off from mainstream information sources and health care can be at disproportionate risk of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and blood borne viruses (BBVs) including HIV infection. Many of those at risk are young people.
In Canada, the proportion of indigenous people among AIDS cases has increased steadily over the past decade. Aboriginal people make up only 3.3% of the Canadian population yet represent an estimated 6-12% of new HIV infections. Some 40% of all new infections among indigenous people are under 30 years of age. Aboriginals are infected at a younger age than non-Aboriginals. Rates of sexually transmitted infections also remain high among indigenous youth.
CIET has been invited to help address these health inequalities and their implications. In 1998, we collaborated with the Assembly of First Nations in a study on youth resilience to HIV/AIDS in two rural locations in the James Bay region and two urban centres – Montreal and Winnipeg. The results showed that accurate knowledge of HIV/AIDS risks was considerably lower in remote communities.
Building on this experience, and guided by the Alberta Treaty 8 ACRA Elders Advisory Committee, we have been laying the foundation for community-based studies on Aboriginal youth resilience to HIV/AIDS and related diseases with several Alberta Treaty 8 communities in rural Alberta. Community members participated in a training course and are currently conducting their baseline study, with results anticipated by March 2008.
At left: Photo taken at an Alberta Treaty 8 youth conference. At right: Researchers from Tlicho communities in the Northwest Territories of Canada during a CIET training session for research and planning on youth resilience to HIV/AIDS in Yellowknife
In the Tlicho region of the Northwest Territories of Canada, the Tlicho Community Services Agency's (TCSA) Healing Wind Advisory Committee and CIET facilitated research to support community interventions targeting sexually transmitted infections and HIV/AIDS. The project recruited and trained community-based researchers who carried out a survey on sexual health attitudes and behaviours in the four Tlicho communities, covering 65% of the population above 9 years of age. The research process, outcomes and the strategic plan that arose from the research findings produced a clear framework for interventions that are grounded in the community, such as focus groups with youth, and further training of community health workers on communicating about STIs with identified high risk groups. A summary report on the Tlicho survey and strategic plan is available from the library. An article on the entire experience has been published in the Summer 2008 edition of Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Indigenous and Aboriginal Community Health.
A nine-minute video entitled "The Partnership" captures the experience of this project: Set in the beautiful Northwest Territories, the video explores how Aboriginal communities are working with health researchers for the community’s benefit. Told through the eyes of Tlicho community-based researchers, “The Partnership” demonstrates that no matter what the issue, the solutions always lie within the community. Link: http://media.extension.ualberta.ca/media/show_item.php?buttonClick=1
Urban sites in Ottawa and Edmonton are now in the setting-up process and will soon be selecting and training their Community-Based Researchers (CBRs).
These studies also touch on the links between sexual violence and HIV infection among youth, which remains a largely unexplored issue in Canada.
This project is funded by an International Collaborative Indigenous Health Research Parrtnership grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). Partner countries are Australia and New Zeland. CIET's Canadian partners on the research team are the Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network (CAAN) and the Public Health Agency of Canada. The special issue of Pimatisiwin mentioned above also published the research proposal and a sample data sharing agreement for this project.
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