Over 10,000 pieces of condoms were shared free of charge to people during the celebration of the annual Aboakyer festival of the chiefs and people of the Effutu Traditional Area at Winneba on Saturday. The Project-Coordinator of the Charles Aikins Live and Let's Live Foundation, Mrs Josephine Boadi Danquah disclosed. Mrs Danquah said the rationale behind the distribution was as a result of the alarming rate of the spread of HIV/AIDS in the area. She appealed to the people especially the youth to change their sexual behaviour to avoid contracting the pandemic that is real and has no cure. A Community Based Organisation (CBO) based in Winneba, the Assemblies of God Unisex Virgins of Faith also distributed leaflets on sexually transmitted diseases during the occasion. Mrs Danquah said statistics from the District Health Management Directorate indicated that from January to November 2006, out of 562 persons screened, 61 made up of 52 males and 9 females tested HIV positive. According to her 512 people who came for voluntary counselling and testing during the same period, 162 proved HIV positive. She said it was in the light of the frightening figures that her NGO had intensified its campaign to prevent the disease from reaching crises levels by distributing the condoms but not to encourage immorality. Mrs Danquah said the disease has left many orphans and vulnerable children in the District, whose care had become very difficult, adding that the plight of these children would be worsened when the Catholic Relief Services presently catering for them by way of supplying them with food relief items, faced out its programme in 2008. She appealed to other NGOs and philanthropists both in the country and outside to come to the aid of the children. Source: GNA