I like well made advocacy videos - and the one that British Red Cross released today definitely falls into this category. It features Konnie Huq, a well know and very sexy tv-presenter (well known in the UK). The question is: "Would you still want to kiss her, if she was HIV positive?"

The reason this video was made is a survey that British Red Cross commissioned of 16-25-year-olds in the UK. The result:

Even though 85 per cent know you cannot catch HIV from a kiss, 69 per cent of respondents said they wouldn't kiss someone with HIV.

Or as British Red Cross puts it: "There is safety. And then there is stigma."

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/f49b798beafb70833c4ff053b33ea6fe.htmAFRICA: Tell us more – Children call for sex education 11 Dec 2008 23:43:25 GMT Source: IRINReuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone. DAKAR, 11 December 2008 (IRIN) - Children in sub-Saharan Africa want to know more about sex and how to protect themselves from HIV, but taboos surrounding children's sexuality can mean life-saving information is kept from them, according to an international NGO.

Is education in Africa changing as mobile telephony expands to rural areas and rates keep dropping?

As we have said in previous post the power of the video have no limits. Just think about the images that we saw coming from the Beijing Olympics ceremony, or the images we saw coming from the quick war between Russia and Georgia.  But there are other important issues that go uncovered. There are heart-breaking stories that go unheard. What news networks tend to cover are the political side of the issues, but hardly the human side. The reason being that they think they are not news worthy.

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Well I'm glad I found Net2 yesterday, right up my street as we say, as that's where we're coming from. A selection of other projects on the go which I haven't submitted here.

First, there's the campaign to raise awareness of the Holodomor, or Famine-Genocide in Ukraine, the aim being to leverage public support and encourage MEPs to sign up to a UN declaration.  

http://www.holodomor.org.uk/   

Then there's the current day issue of HIV/AIDS awareness and a collaboration with others using the medium of music to spread the message:

http://lena-ivanova.com.thecoolserver.com/