Dili, 18 April 2026 (Media Democracia) – The National Institute for the Fight against HIV-AIDS (INCSIDA) continues to provide training for youth from the Vera-Cruz Protestant Church in Dili on how to prevent transmission of HIV-AIDS.
According to the President of the National Institute for the Fight against HIV-AIDS, Daniel Marçal, youth, especially in churches must also be concerned about health because while they can rely on prayer, effort is needed to prevent transmission of the virus.
“I’m saying that preventing HIV-AIDS cases is not just through prayer but requires effort, because now many young people are contracting HIV-AIDS. Not everyone understands this, how to prevent HIV-AIDS from infecting them. Youth from churches also have a very big role in contributing to national development. Now, to contribute to national development we cannot just pray; we must make efforts to protect churches to stay away from HIV-AIDS. As church youth, you must make an effort to know how HIV is transmitted. There is no cure for HIV-AIDS, it is only controlled with antiretroviral (ARV) medicine which functions to reduce the HIV virus in the blood, increase the immune system, and help patients live healthy and normal lives.” said Daniel Marçal.
In the same place, Pastor of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Timor-Leste (IEPTL), Carlos Marçal, added that on the church side this is positive and very good. Through the church we have rules based on the Bible.
“The training means the church is limited it only knows its people who go to church. We also need the government, from the national institute, and not just within the church. The government coming to carry out this role to inform about HIV-AIDS is important, because it’s not only transmitted through casual sex. We ask young people to give importance to each person’s own self, because many people have died from this disease, so we must be careful with our lives.” said Pastor of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Timor-Leste (IEPTL), Carlos Marçal.
In addition, the representative of the Evangelical Youth Chief, José Gonçalves Barreto, said that all of them, especially Christian youth, are attending this training as part of the youth’s role to spread information to others.
“This training is so we continue to learn to keep ourselves away from this disease which commonly spreads especially among youth.Therefore, as youth we must learn a lot to avoid this disease. As leaders, our first action is to prepare young people and give them training like this. On the other side, for the body and the spirit, our training must not only be physica, we must also improve people’s minds and hearts so they don’t fall into sin. Because if we don’t improve spiritually, people will always keep falling into sin.” said Evangelical Youth Chief José Gonçalves.
INCSIDA is a public institute in Timor-Leste responsible for defining, coordinating, and supporting the execution of the National Strategy and all action plans regarding the fight against HIV/AIDS. The main objective of this institute is to strengthen prevention efforts and reduce the impact of HIV in the country, especially given the situation showing an increase in HIV cases among diverse populations, including pregnant women and patients with sexually transmitted infections.
Report By: Tomas dos Santos and Trainee Leonizia
Photo By: Tomas dos Santos and Trainee Leoniza