Programme Implementing Entities

National AIDS Centre

The National Coordination Office for the Prevention of AIDS was founded in 1992, its task to conduct HIV prevention projects and develop people living with HIV/AIDS care in Poland. The office operated on a national scale and answered directly to the Minister of Health and Social Welfare. In 1999, it was transformed into the National AIDS Centre, which not only had a different structure, but also a broader scope of activity. The Centre coordinates HIV/AIDS prevention and education projects and supervises HIV/AIDS diagnostic, prevention and treatment programmes in the public health system.

TADA
Association for HIV/AIDS and STI Prevention

The Association's main activity is relaying information on HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STI), safe sex, anonymous and cost-free HIV testing and cooperation with local NGOs and other institution involved in HIV/AIDS and STI prevention.

Mother and Child Institute

The Mother and Child Institute was founded in 1948 and is one of the major medical R&D institutions in Poland. The Institute's highly-qualified medical staff are in close touch with similar centres abroad. The Mother and Child Institute offers treatment, patient-friendly counselling and all-round help in resolving health problems. Equal weight is laid on prevention, education and health promotion. The Institute also verifies maternity and baby foods and child equipment (comforters, prams) sold on the Polish market;moreover, it promotes health policies in the press, on tv and radio.

In 2003 the Institute's Maternity and Gynecology Clinic received over 21 thousand births, close to 14% of which were early and deliverable only with the help of sophisticated medicine. The clinic also carried out 400 gynecological operations and diagnosed 25 defected foetuses in prenatal examinations.

MARATON Foundation for the Prevention of Drug Addiction

Main Goals:

promotion of knowledge about addiction to mind-altering substances and HIV/AIDS
prevention among children and young people (meetings, seminars, conferences, training courses, health-promoting events, community activities, etc.)
clinical and other help to people experimenting with drugs and drug addicts (clinics, training centres, hostels, addict readjustment centres)
psychological, psychiatric, legal and welfare aid

Activities:

consulting, intervention, therapy (individual/family/group) for people with drug problems (prevention, rehabilitation, post-rehab programmes in 3 facilities)
school prevention programmes for teachers, parents and pupils
local peer education-based prevention programmes (Young Health Promotion Leaders, Backyard Leaders, integrated community projects)
training courses for police, city guards, probation officers, etc.

Provincial Infection Hospital - Independent Public Health Centre

The Clinic offers health services, diagnostics, stationary and outpatient treatment and counselling on infectious diseases. Under contracts with universities and schools the Clinic also conducts training for persons under supervision of the Mazovia province The Clinic's AIDS Diagnostic and Therapy Centre consists of several wards, a Prevention and Treatment Station, and Immunology Station, a Clinical Mycobacteriology Section, a PCR, Microbiology Station and a Clinical Research Section. The Centre provides all-round aid to people living with HIV/AIDS using state-of-the-art treatment methods, conducts prevention projects and diagnostics and cooperates on HIV/AIDS-related matters with local and state authorities.

Social Aid Association

The Association was founded in 1993 as a provider of services not included in the national welfare system to addicts, people living with HIV/AIDS and their families (also uninsured cases ineligible for treatment elsewhere).

Youth Counselling and Sex Education Centre, Zielona Góra University

The Youth Counselling and Sex Education Centre was founded in 1993 as a research and educational facility of the Zielona Góra University.

It is the only facility of its kind in Poland, simultaneously involved in R&D work, instruction in sexual behaviour and sexual and reproductive health, and practical projects. Among others, the centre monitors prostitution and the spread of child pornography and offers counselling for sexual violence victims.

On June 2001 the Centre opened a web monitoring section which scans the Internet for traces of child pornography and child prostitution.

MONAR Association

MONAR was founded in 1978 but is registered officially since 1981.

It is a nationwide apolitical non-governmental organization offering a complex, modern system of aiding drug addiction and homelessness and all-round help to people suffering under social exclusion.
MONAR is one of the biggest organizations of its kind in the world, annually aiding over 75 thousand people through 163 programmes. MONAR employs a staff of over 700, including 400 volunteers.

The MONAR programme covers:

addiction prevention
treatment, rehabilitation and therapy for drug addicts
social readjustment
harm reduction

The MONAR Association is a member of numerous domestic and foreign organizations and associations; including the World Federation of Therapeutic Communities (WFTC) and the European Network for Drug Services in Prison (ENDSP).

The main MONAR goals are:

drug prevention among young people
assistance to drug-endangered youth and young drug addicts
assistance in social readaptation to drug abstainers
drug education (addiction: social costs and effects, social and psychological causes)
successful cooperation in drug prevention with government agencies

Cracow Association for Assistance to Drug Dependent People

The Cracow Association for Assistance to Drug Dependent People was founded in 1981 with the aim of integrating and training staff for drug, dependency, HIV and HCV programmes as well as aid projects for addicts and their families. The Association's general aim is providing all-round help to drug addicts and dependency endangered people, especially drug users and people living with HIV/AIDS.

This is achieved through:

youth prevention projects
resocialization and readaptation
aid to drug addicts and their families
research work in addiction diagnostics, support of dependency research
cooperation with institutions responsible for dependency prevention, and the resocialization and readptation of drug addicts and drug-endangered persons

Central Prison Board

The prison health service is responsible for the health of jail inmates. This includes medical, prevention, diagnostic, therapeutic and rehabilitation services, medical supplies, health promotion, health education - and cooperation with outside health centres, especially in cases which cannot be treated by prison medical facilities.

In accord with the National Health Programme, the National Programme for HIV Prevention and Care for people living with HIV/AIDS and the National Tuberculosis Prevention Programme the prison health service has set itself the following tasks:

curtailing smoking,
reducing alcohol-caused damage
reducing drug-caused damage
increasing infection prevention
activating handicapped people

There are also HIV and hepatitis harm reduction programmes (especially B and C).