youth; risk
This paper demonstrates that certain notions of young people in the HIV and AIDS response reveal an overly generalised understanding of ‘youth’ that does not reflect a realistic view of young people’s identity and lives. Faulty stereotypes of ‘youth’ – such as the perceptions that young people are necessarily victims or risk-takers – result in many HIV programmes based on generalisations about young people, rather than their actual needs and realities.
