By Nangamso Mabindla
2 June 2004

THE Buffalo City municipality is about to conduct a groundbreaking HIV/Aids prevalence study amongst its 5 000 employees.

The study, which will be conducted by a three-member team from the Medical Research Council (MRC), will assist the municipality in discovering the percentage of its employees infected with the virus and will offer employees the opportunity to know their HIV status.

"When we conduct the same study in other cities, we will use the Buffalo City study as a guideline," said Liz Thomas from the Health and Development Research Group (HDRG) of the MRC, addressing a workshop at the Regent Hotel in East London on Tuesday, 1 June.

According to Thomas, local authorities had an important role to play in the fight against the pandemic. "Municipalities are service providers to the communities; they supply water, sanitation and electricity. It is important therefore for these providers to know their status," she said.

Thomas said the Buffalo City municipality was also concerned about the issue in a broader sense. "That is why we want local government to respond to the study as well - we will work with the Department of Provincial and Local Government to ensure that the study is a success," she said.

Mark Colvin of the HIV Prevention Research Unit outlined the goals of the study, which will help make projections to deal with absenteeism in the workplace caused by HIV/Aids:

• Providing accurate data on population of people infected and the distribution of the virus in the workplace
• Providing baseline data of HIV prevalence and behavioral practices and measure future improvement and the effectiveness of various interventions
• Providing information for planning and formulating health promotion activities

Encouraging senior officials to take the lead, Cherrie Zuccarani, from the Epicentre in Johannesburg which will conduct the tests, said: "The test is confidential and voluntary; we won't force anyone to test, but we encourage full participation if we're going to conduct an accurate test."

The team chose blood rather than saliva testing as the former had proved more accurate in the past, Zuccarani said. Research was expected to commence on 21 June and the municipality was expected to provide counselling for infected employees.

South African Cities Network HIV/Aids mainstreaming co-ordinator Ntombini Marrengane thanked the municipality for taking the lead in testing employees. "We hope the other cities will follow suit and do what Buffalo City has done; it's really a bold step in the right direction."