SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, July 9, 2005. Working in partnerships with the USAID-funded Family Health International/Conecta project, the Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative and the Dominican Ministry of Health’s DIGECTISS, BRA launched in August the “Proyecto Arco Iris/Rainbow Project,” a comprehensive HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment program targeting 20 bateyes in the Monte Plata Province, Dominican Republic.

Haiti and the Dominican Republic combined account for the Caribbean’s 85% total HIV/AIDS cases– and second highest to sub Sahara Africa. HIV/AIDS prevalence in the bateyes – impoverished Dominican Republic’s sugar cane plantations slum communities inhabited mostly by Haitian migrant families and Dominicans of Haitian origin, is significantly higher at 5% than the national average of 1%. But batey HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and care efforts are extremely limited. “We are working diligently to find ways to involve all interested parties in the process of attending to all infected with the virus,” said Ulrick Gaillard, CEO of the BRA.

The Rainbow Project is multifaceted and includes: identification of patients living with HIV and AIDS through surveys and large-scale testing; counseling; medical attention including antiretroviral therapy and treatment of opportunistic infections; and laboratory testing including CD4 tests. It will also provide attention to pregnant women and work to prevent the vertical transmission of the virus. At full capacity, the project will accommodate 1,700 people in total: 100 pregnant women, 1000 children, orphans and vulnerable individuals, 200 people living with HIV/AIDS, and 400 affected individuals living with HIV patients.

The project is comprehensive in that it will attend not only to HIV patients, but also to vulnerable and affected children and adults living with HIV patients in the form of food and clothing donations, economic self-sufficiency seminars and counseling. BRA is also initiating preventative health/hygiene education and empowerment programs through a network of community health promoters and young adults.

This program, when fully operational, will be an example of quality, comprehensive HIV/AIDS treatment in the Dominican Republic. “It is BRA’s hope that other organizations will take after BRA’s example and initiate, with BRA’s guidance, similar programs both inside the Dominican Republic and abroad,” concluded Gaillard.