#WorthMore Campaign
With the support of a small grant from the Aerosmith Fund for Prevention and Treatment of AIDS and HIV, researchers from Boston Children’s Hospital’s Global Health Program and Center for Media and Child Health organized focus groups with over 100 youth in urban, semi-urban and rural areas in Zambia to understand what youth currently know about HIV and what topics they wanted to learn more about in order to start conversations within their communities about HIV. In these focus groups, the youth had a limited baseline knowledge of HIV prevention, facts and consequences. Additionally, youth universally mentioned transactional sex (sex in exchange for hair extensions or talk time) as one of the main problems that puts them at risk for HIV today. To address this, a group including representatives from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston Children’s Hospital’s Global Health Program, Boston Children’s Hospital’s Center for Media and Child Health, and Zambian public health experts worked with Zambian singer Ephraim, Son of Africa to create “Worth More,” a music video that utilizes known public health messaging techniques to educate Zambian youth on the risks of HIV and, in this song, the risks of transactional sex.
Follow up surveys of 100 youth in the same rural, semi-urban, and urban areas have shown that the messages in the video were clearly communicated to the target audience. The “Worth More” music video was released on YouTube in February of 2018 and, with limited promotion, has been viewed by more than 50,000 people over multiple channels. It has also received radio and television play, and over 3000 CDs were distributed. In post-release surveys, 100% of youth surveyed were able to correctly identify the message embedded in the song: “HIV is real. You are worth more than material things.” This song serves as a proof of concept that intentional messaging can work to effectively communicate public health messages.
I understand that these luxuries and expensive stuff are nothing compared to someone’s life – girls need to keep their bodies safe. HIV/AIDS is real.
Youth response to post-video survey