April 2007 saw the publication of a joint ISAAC and ACET (AIDS Care, Education and Training) Resource Manual on HIV and AIDS for workers in Christian drug rehabilitation centres in Russia.

The concept for such a manual was born a few years ago when it became clear that the issues of HIV and AIDS were growing alarmingly in Russia, especially in the drug rehabilitation centres where it is usual to find that anywhere between one third and three-quarters of the men and women on the programmes or working as staff members are living with HIV. In Russia the HIV epidemic was largely fuelled at the beginning by people sharing needles. There was a lot of material available, but most of it was just a translation of material from the west or elsewhere, and none of it was particularly aimed at Christians or those running rehabilitation programmes.

Over the time that it has taken to finally get the manual finished a number of people have been involved – collating the information already available, writing the facts and figures in a way that anyone can understand without over-simplifying, finding out the sort of information that the leaders of the centres want to know, etc.

The authors of the manual are Mikhail and Nadiya Telepov, Christian psychologists who have written a number of other books. They decided to divide the book into one-page chapters, each dealing with a particular question or issue (e.g. ‘What are the ways of transmitting HIV?’, ‘How to help a person to adapt to their HIV positive status’, ‘How to counsel a discordant couple before the marriage’, etc.). This means that it is very easy to find advice or information on a particular topic without having to read through the whole book.

The editing team who reviewed the book included people from ACET-Russia, people running drug rehabilitation programmes and people living with HIV themselves. Through the review process extra chapters were added, making 60 in total. These extra chapters meant that the manual’s potential audience widened to include pastors and other church workers. The manual also includes relevant laws from Russia and details of other resources. The manual is only available in Russian – it has been written by Russians for Russians in a style and language that they can understand and relate to.

The reception to the manual has so far been very positive: “This is just what we need”, “Its clear accessible and well presented.”

We are currently actively involved with putting together versions of the manual for Ukraine and the Russian-speaking Central Asian countries.