10th UNESCO Youth Forum

“When I was six years old, my mother died of HIV but I was never told what happened to her. Even today, talking about safe sex and HIV remains taboo. As a young female activist at university, I was desperate to change the way young people view HIV/AIDS. During one of my courses, I read a research paper about a class on “sugar daddies” that had reduced teenage pregnancy by 28% in Kenya. This resonated with me as it showed that openly discussing issues around HIV with young women could actually save lives. I joined forces with my colleague, Noam, and we founded Young 1ove.”
 
“Young 1ove connects youth to proven, life-saving information, through evidence-based educational programmes. While lots of research papers on HIV prevention exist, most young women do not have direct access to this life-saving information. Our organization aims to fill these gaps and connect the people to the information!”
 
“Over the next three years, we aim to scale-up at least three of our health education programmes to reach 1 million youth across Eastern and Southern Africa. Our main challenge is to figure out ways to ensure that our messaging remains relevant and relatable to young people. Information alone is not enough. We need to make sure that it is delivered in a way that will really resonate and apply to each and every young person.”