We are delighted to share with you our 2022 Annual Report & Accounts. Our partners and donors play a critical role in allowing us to support children and young people across Lesotho and Botswana to thrive. We would like to thank you all for your ongoing commitment.
Our financial year ending 31st August 2022, was a year of significant progress for Sentebale. We were able to rebuild many of our programmes following COVID-19 ensuring children and young people have access to vital health services, receive care and support and the skills to build a sustainable foundation for the future. We hope you enjoy reading the report.
Richard Miller, CEO
Highlights of the year included:
- Success stories of transformational change experienced in the lives of young people we work with.
- As part of our existing Global Fund grant, we delivered HIV/TB prevention programmes to 27,789 adolescent girls and young women across Lesotho contributing to the UN targets on reducing new HIV infections and ending AIDS by 2030.
- A three-year study of our Clubs and Camps programme for children and young people was published showing evidence of improved wellbeing for 10 to 19-year-olds living with HIV. Read more here
- Through the DREAMS programme, 3,377 adolescent girls and young women aged 15 to 24-years-old were screened for HIV testing and counselling services with 608 referred for follow up post screening.
- Our Let Youth Lead advocates received feedback from 3,333 young people on improvements to be made in healthcare facilities to support their peers and meetings were held with the facilities to share the feedback and implement change.
- The Global Fund for HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria awarded us a new two-year grant of £2.5million to address underlying causes of the HIV pandemic, as well as preventing new infections and improving HIV literacy.
Founding Patrons’ Foreword
Prince Harry, The Duke of Sussex and Prince Seeiso
“It’s been over 16 years since we founded Sentebale, but our mission remains the same and our resolve as strong as ever.
We created Sentebale to give children and vulnerable young people in Southern Africa access to vital health services, alongside the care and support needed to build skills and thrive. Sentebale symbolises our core pledge, in memory of our mothers, to never forget and always advocate for the most vulnerable among us.
In the years since our founding, we have scaled up, expanded and evolved our operations, delivering our holistic package of support to children and young people in Lesotho and Botswana. We focus on social and emotional wellbeing for those coming to terms with living with HIV, providing access to health services, youth advocacy, and building individual skills and livelihoods.
Lesotho and Botswana have the second and third highest HIV infection rates globally but, thanks to effective prevention and treatment programmes, remarkable progress has been made in recent years. In 2021, Lesotho met the UN Fast-Track targets where 90% of people with HIV know their status, 90% who know their status are receiving treatment, and 90% on HIV treatment have a suppressed viral load so the likelihood of passing on infection is greatly reduced. In Botswana, rates of adult HIV prevalence have halved in the last 20 years and the country is on its way to becoming the first in Africa to eliminate mother-to-child transmissions. The virtual elimination of HIV is within sight and is possible. These gains are remarkable and largely down to the determination and resilience of the Basotho and Batswana people and their communities.
Despite the many successes, the last few years have shown the road to ending AIDS as a global health threat by 2030 continues to experience setbacks. The fight is not over, and we cannot falter now. Young people and their families have had to navigate the hardship of two global health pandemics – COVID-19 and HIV/AIDS – which have left communities with a number of complex social challenges to tackle. This means we cannot rest on our laurels of the progress made, rather we must gather pace to ensure we maintain the work and achieve our goals.
Sentebale is playing an important part in ensuring gains are maximised and setbacks are responded to. Children and young people are at the heart of what we do; they have the solutions, and our aim is to make sure their voices are heard.
We are incredibly proud of the help our teams provide, their hard work and dedication to the global effort, and we are enormously grateful to all our supporters who make it possible. What drives us all is our admiration and respect for the children and young people we work with. Every day they make us more determined to build a more vibrant future together.”
