Ward leading national campaign against AIDS

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The first Alberta Native to test positive for the virus which often leads to AIDS is spearheading a national campaign to educate aboriginal people about the deadly disease. He's just praying he'll be around to see it through.

Ken Ward, an Enoch reserve Indian who gained national attention after revealing in March he had tested HIV-positive is helping set up the Feather of Hope Society in Edmonton. The new group will teach Native people about AIDS on a continuing basis.

"It's only a dream for me right now," he confides, "but hopefully it will evolve into a long-term project. "I just pray I'll be around to see it happen."

Ward has been working with the Edmonton AIDS Network to establish training programs for Native youths and he has been touring Alberta Native communities speaking about the causes and effects of AIDS.

He believes he's been making headway with his own efforts to educate Native people about the ills of fast living, which can lead to AIDS, but says there is much more to be done.

Since being interviewed for the March 16 issue of Windspeaker, Ward, 33, has been on national network news and was invited to speak to Native groups across the country.

Ward says he wants to set up on-reserve resource centers and to produce videos about AIDS that could have national distribution.

The Feather of Hope Society will be made up of Native health leaders and social service representatives from northern Alberta. They have yet to meet to decide terms of reference so the new group doesn't conflict with health groups already established.

"I just feel contend I started something," says War.

Before leaving Enoch reserve for Vancouver two years ago, the only education Ward had about AIDS came from a poster taped to a band-office wall. It wasn't enough to keep him fromintravenous drug use, the second leading cause in the spread of AIDS.

After being blasted with the news in 1989 his freewheeling, drug-binge days would likely result in his death, he decided he would work to help his people become informed about the deadliest disease to hit the planet since the bubonic plague.

Feather of Hope Society member Anne Anderson says she hopes the project will eventually help teach Natives and non-Natives what can happen if their attitudes toward sex and drugs don't change.

Though AIDS is feared to be growing in Native communities across Canada, Anderson says white society is responsible for prolonging the crisis.

"The world has gotten itself into a terrible, terrible mess," she rages.

"But it's a problem everybody has to (help resolve)."

Barry Breau, executive director of the Edmonton AIDS Network, notes Natives are at particular risk because they don't have access to AIDS information.

He said education about the causes and effects of AIDS and preventive measures are foreign subjects to Native groups nationally.

A Sept. 5, 1989 national aboriginal study determined the greatest concentration of HIV-positive cases was in Ontario, which reported 1,777 cases. Four were Native males; one was a Native female.

Quebec had 897 reported cases. Six were Native males and two were females.

There were 601 cases in British Columbia. One was a Native male. There were no female cases.

Alberta had 170 cases. There was just one Native, Ken Ward of Enoch.