The Wa Polytechnic has developed an HIV/AIDS Policy Framework with financial support from the World Bank under the Teaching and Learning Innovation Fund (TALIF) to help create awareness of the disease among its 800 students and 80 staff. It would also educate about 1,000 residents in the neighbouring communities about HIV/AIDS and persuade them to embrace the; “I choose life” concept that the Polytechnic had adopted to help stem the spread of the disease. Mr. Solomon A. Dansieh, Vice Rector of the Polytechnic made these known in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Wa on Thursday. He said part of the fund had been used by the Management Studies Department to implement a project on awareness creation, with the Saskatchewan Institute of Applied Science and Technology (SIAST) from Canada providing the expertise. Mr. Dansieh, who is also the Project Organiser said the Polytechnic had established an HIV/AIDS Committee and a Campus Club to sustain activities of the programme. He said the pandemic had become a global issue, and current prevalence rates were higher among the youth. Mr. Dansieh said the Wa Polytechnic has no hostel facilities and that, students had to look elsewhere for their own accommodation in the communities, a situation which exposed them to, not only extortion by landlords, but also all the perils and temptations that could make them vulnerable to the pandemic. He said the Polytechnic had therefore, developed a policy framework to help educate the students to adopt appropriate lifestyles to secure themselves from the disease. The Polytechnic authorities in collaboration with the Upper West Regional Coordinating Council (RCC) and the Ghana Health Services had carried out an HIV/AIDS voluntary testing and counselling exercise among the students. A surveillance exercise had also been conducted by the Regional Health Directorate for the students. Mr. Dansieh said the Ghana AIDS Commission had also assisted the Polytechnic with funds under its Multi-Sectoral HIV/AIDS sub project, part of which had been used to sensitise the people of Kongu, a community three kilometres from the Polytechnic, on HIV/AIDS. He said such sensitization campaigns had been beneficial as many people in the communities had now accepted voluntary counselling and testing. Mr. Dansieh said an HIV/AIDS Counselling Centre would also be established on campus, while billboards with HIV/AIDS messages would be mounted at strategic points to create indelible pictures of realities of the pandemic on the minds of the students, staff and the public. Source: GNA