By Agwanda Jowi

INTENSIFIED efforts to encourage more men in Nyanza Province to take advantage of Voluntary Medical Male Circumcision Services (VMMC) reached 19,342 men and boys in the month of August—more than four times the monthly average of 4,125,says a report in Male Circumcision Consortium news and e-newsletter written by Family Health International (FHI) about male circumcision for HIV prevention.

“The government and its partners were able to more than quadruple the number of (VMMC) clients for the month by employing strategies and lessons learned from the Rapid Results Initiative (RRI) of November-December 2009, when more than 37,000 men and boys were circumcised over 30 days” says the report..

The report further says that like the 2009 RRI, the effort to accelerate uptake of VMMC services was conducted during the school holidays, when programme implementers have noticed an increase in the number of clients seeking male circumcision.

It aslo says that like last year’s RRI, the effort addressed supply and demand, with measures to make VMMC services more accessible and others to promote men’s use of the services.

The partners who collaborated with the Ministries of Health (MOH) during the August initiative were the Nyanza Reproductive Health Society, IMPACT Research and Development Organisation, Family AIDS Care and Education Services, the Catholic Medical Mission Board, and the AIDS Population and Health (APHIA) II Nyanza Project.

Thea above and other partners are working with the MOH to prepare for an even more extensive effort to meet the demand for VMMC, through the 2010 Rapid Results Initiative. The campaign will be held from November 22 to December 17.

ENDS