Tesfaye A, Lalisa C, Dejene H, Nigatu D, Tekalign B and Yayehyirad Y
Background: Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) is a disease of Human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). It is a major public health problem in many parts of the world, and is considered as a pandemic disease. Voluntary test and counseling of HIV is internationally acknowledged to be an essential strategy for HIV prevention and also entry point to AIDS care.
Objective: To assess knowledge, attitude and practice toward HIV voluntary testing and counseling among students of Mizan High School, in Mizan-Aman town, SNNPR, South-West Ethiopia.
Methods: Institutional based descriptive cross-sectional study design was used from March 01-March 20, 2017. The total sample size (341) of the study participants were selected by using systematic sampling techniques. Data was collected by using structured self-administered questionnaire. Prior to analysis, data was entered using Epi data and cleaned and exported in to SPSS version 20.00 and descriptive statistics was computed.
Results: A total of 329 students participated in the study with non-response rate 3.6%. Almost all 325 (98.8%) of respondents had heard about HIV/AIDS and 311 (94%) were heard about voluntary HIV testing and counseling. Two hundred sixty four 264 (80.2%) agreed that voluntary HIV testing and counseling service was necessary. Majority 297 (90.3%) the study participants were knowledgeable about voluntary testing and counseling of HIV and 243 (73.8%) of the study participants had positive attitude towards voluntary testing and counseling of HIV. According to this study, only 103 (31.3%) of the respondents had voluntary testing and counseling of HIV.
Conclusion: The finding of this study showed that most of the youths have a good level of knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS and VTC. Majority 243 (73.8%) of the study participants had positive attitude towards voluntary testing and counseling of HIV. Still the practice of voluntary test and counseling of HIV was very low among students of Mizan High school