Rotary and Baylor College of Medicine in Africa

Building a brighter future for children and adolescents with HIV/AIDS

In 15 years, the Baylor College of Medicine International Pediatric AIDS Initiative at Texas Children’s Hospital (BIPAI) has grown from one paediatric AIDS clinic in Romania to a network of operations stretching across sub-Saharan Africa. BIPAI, in partnership with host country governments and private partners, now provides free of charge, state–of-the-art paediatric HIV care, treatment and support to over 200,000 HIV-infected children and their families, about double the number of HIV-infected children living in the U.S., Canada, and Western Europe combined.

BIPAI’s first African clinical centre of excellence (COE), in Botswana, now treats over 4,000 children, most of whom are now surviving into adolescence. It is expected that the number of HIV positive adolescents enrolled in care will double by 2015.

Despite this nationwide trend, there is a paucity of psychosocial support programs addressing adolescents’ specific issues, which led the Botswana-Baylor COE to partner with the Rotary Club of Gaborone, along with a network of Rotary Clubs in the U.S. and beyond via a Global Grant, to build and equip an adolescent HIV/AIDS centre. First of its kind in Botswana and the African continent, the Phatsimong Adolescent Center is a safe and welcoming place where adolescents receive life skills education and health counselling, leading to improved clinical and mental health outcomes as well as a healthy transition into adulthood.

Ed Pettitt is a Rotarian with the Houston Skyline Rotary Club and a visiting Rotarian with the Rotary Club of Gaborone, in Botswana, where he is currently working as a Senior Project Coordinator for the Baylor College of Medicine International Pediatric AIDS Initiative. Ed oversees the world's largest network of peer support programs for adolescents living with HIV and is also helping to launch a paediatric genomics research imitative in sub-Saharan Africa.

Ed has also served as a HIV/AIDS technical expert for the World Health Organization and UNICEF and is co-founder of the Houston Global Health Collaborative. He is a Rotary International Paul Harris Fellow.