December, 2010
CES Canada Celebrates “Unsung Hero”
World Aids Day 2010
World AIDS Day is celebrated on December 1 each year around the world. It has become one of the most recognized international health days and a key opportunity to raise awareness, commemorate those who have passed on, and celebrate victories such as increased access to treatment and prevention services.
CES Canada exists to alleviate poverty and fight HIV/Aids in Kenya. It’s foundations centre on education, clean water, health care and the provision of food through farm management. Since 2004, 200 secondary school scholarships have been offered to youth orphaned or affected by the HIV/Aids pandemic. CES operates in a family of 15 schools impacting on 4,000 students in Western Province, Kenya.
In support of World Aids Day, CES Canada celebrates and honours an “unsung hero” and salutes one individual whose contribution to the fight against HIV/Aids is exemplary.
Ida Mukuka, 39, serves as a full-time field representative for the Stephen LewisFoundation in Africa. She uses her extensive knowledge and experience to help build the capacity of grassroots AIDS organizations throughout sub-Saharan Africa. In March 2010 Ida visited Kakamega, Kenya. Since then CES has experienced her friendship and strong support for its mission.
Ida is a widowed mother of four children. In 2001, soon after her husband and brother died of AIDS, she began working as an HIV counsellor at the Chelstone clinic in Lusaka, Zambia. As a gifted counsellor, Ida advised HIV-positive pregnant women on the prevention of mother-to-child transmission and provided care and support to people living with HIV. Her remarkable story is chronicled in Stephanie Nolen’s book,28 Stories of AIDS in Africa.
Ida Mukuka - Thanksgiving 2010
In 2003, while working as an AIDS counsellor, she tested HIV-positive. After learning her status, Ida became an even more vocal and passionate activist for people living with HIV and AIDS. She was promoted to the role of Director of Community Outreach at the Center for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ), where she helped to create support groups and a peer education programme where people living with HIV and AIDS provide counselling and support services in all public clinics offering antiretroviral drugs.
Ida’s leadership and activism earned her a fellowship to study at the Coady International Institute at St. Francis Xavier University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. While there she was awarded the Katherine Fleming Award for International Development.
On December 1, 2010 CES Canada salutes and honours Ida Mukuka, a remarkable African woman, a courageous hero, colleague and friend.
