- About UNAIDS
- Our work
- Targets and commitments
- 2011 Political Declaration: Targets and elimination commitments
- Reducing sexual transmission
- Preventing HIV among drug users
- Eliminating new HIV infections among children
- 15 million accessing treatment
- Avoiding TB deaths
- Closing the resource gap
- Eliminating gender inequalities
- Eliminating stigma and discrimination
- Eliminating travel restrictions
- Strengthening HIV integration
- 2011 Political Declaration: Targets and elimination commitments
More feature stories on punitive laws
- UNAIDS Executive Director, Yao Ming and Government launch campaign against discrimination in China
- UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé and the Chinese Vice-Minister of Health, Huang Jiefu, launched a campaign in Beijing earlier today to address HIV-related stigma and discrimination. Chinese basketball star Yao Ming and a group of fans that include people living with HIV are the face of the campaign which features two videos and a poster.
- Michel Sidibé commends China’s progress in AIDS response
- UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé, during his visit to China, commended the People’s Republic of China on rises in domestic spending for HIV prevention and care in spite of a global financial crisis where other countries are weighing the risks of making cuts.
- “Just like you” video campaign against stigma and prejudice launched in Brazil
- New campaign to be broadcast by television across Brazil highlights rights of students, gay men, lesbians, people living with HIV, the Afro-Brazilian population, sex workers, refugees, transsexuals and transvestites and drug users.
- Study tour of Police initiatives in India
- National police officers and National AIDS Programme heads from Cambodia, Maldives, Mongolia, Philippines, and Sri Lanka visited India last month to get a firsthand experience of law enforcement initiatives on interventions related to high risk populations.
- Antiretroviral treatment for prevention
- Research suggests that people living with HIV who are following an effective antiretroviral therapy regimen can achieve undetectable viral load, leading to significantly reduced risk of transmitting HIV. However, antiretroviral therapy for prevention has not proven to completely eliminate the risk of transmission the virus. To explore the issue WHO convened a meeting to review scientific data available on this approach.
- UN Secretary-General urges countries to follow the United States and lift travel restrictions for people living with HIV
- Geneva/New York, 31 October 2009 — UNAIDS welcomes President Obama’s announcement of the final rule removing entry restrictions based on HIV status from US policy. The removal of HIV-related travel restrictions in the US overturns a policy that had been in place since 1987. Such restrictions, strongly opposed by UNAIDS, are discriminatory and do not protect public health.
- Michel Sidibé congratulates Indian sexual minority communities for uniting against Section 377
- UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé attended an event in Delhi today to recognize the activists whose efforts contributed towards the recent annulment of Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalized consensual sex between men and transgendered people.
- Gender and sexuality: Partners gather for global expert forum in Asia
- To address the technical and political challenges of reaching sex workers, men who have sex with men, transgender people, and other sexual minority groups while also supporting strong country ownership, the Global Fund, UNAIDS and the Coalition of Asia Pacific Regional Networks on HIV/AIDS is hosting an expert consultation in Bangkok, 5-7 October 2009.
- UNAIDS Forum on HIV, Human Rights and Men Who Have Sex with Men
- As part of his official visit to Washington, D.C., UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé participated in the Forum on HIV, Human Rights and Men Who Have Sex with Men on 16 September 2009. The event was organized by UNAIDS in collaboration with the HIV Policy Working Group on Men Who Have Sex with Men and Other Sexual Minorities, and in cooperation with the Honorable Howard Berman (D-CA) and the Honorable Barbara Lee (D-CA).
- ICAAP 2009: Breaking down legal barriers and criminalization
- Legal barriers and criminalization are blocking the empowerment of groups at high risk of HIV infection such as injecting drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men by denying or obstructing the rights to live healthy and safe lives. To explore and address this global social issue, UNAIDS organized a satellite session at ICAAP on Wednesday 12 August.
- Injecting drug users take central role in anti-stigma film
- The lives of injecting drug users and the HIV-related stigma and discrimination they face was one focus of the IX International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific as the film Suee (Needle) was launched by Response Beyond Borders, the Asian consortium on drug use HIV, AIDS and poverty.
- Landmark Delhi High Court decision recognizes inappropriate criminalization as a barrier to health, human rights and dignity
- The Delhi High Court declared section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalised consensual sexual acts of adults in private as violative of the rights to privacy, liberty, health and equality enshrined in the Constitution of India. Though the decision was largely seen as a victory for the men who sex with men and transgender people, it is a victory for all – regardless of sexual orientation and gender identity. The judgment is noteworthy and progressive in terms of its rejection of a hetero-normative and homogenous conception of sexuality.
- Anti-homophobia campaign to end discrimination in Latin America
- May 17 marks the International Day Against Homophobia which is an initiative to end discrimination and demand respect for the rights of homosexuals, transsexuals and lesbians.
- International Day against Homophobia
- By signing the 2006 United Nations Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, governments committed to removing legal barriers and passing laws to protect vulnerable populations. However, over 80 countries still criminalize consensual same sex acts among adults.
- Strengthening and expanding HIV legal services
- Experience in the response to AIDS has shown that access to legal services is an important part of guaranteeing protection from discrimination, getting redress for human rights violations, and expanding access to HIV prevention and treatment. Yet such programmes are not sufficiently supported by national AIDS responses, and where they do exist, quality and scale are often insufficient.
- 'Never abandon, never give up’: ILO film helps China’s migrant workers challenge AIDS stigma
- Zhang Xiao Hu is one of China’s estimated 200 million migrant workers. He is also one of the stars of ‘Never abandon, never give up’, a short Charlie Chaplin-style film aimed at reducing HIV stigma and promoting condom use among the country’s migrant workers. Beginning on 4 May, the International Labour Organization (ILO) and Mega-info Media, the company which runs China’s national railway station television network, will begin screening the film in 500 stations in 450 cities across the country. Over a three month period, 40 million people will have an opportunity to see the film.
- ILO: Action against stigma brings hope to Ethiopia’s agricultural cooperatives
- Ajama Kalacha works hard on his small agricultural plot in Ethiopia’s highlands to provide an income for the extended family he supports. Even though life is tough, Ajama is an optimist - his community treats him well and he believes his prospects for making a living from the land are good. But he was not always so confident.
- El Salvador: Ministerial decree to reduce homophobia in health services
- The Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance of El Salvador approved, as part of its National Plan on HIV prevention, a set of actions to reduce homophobia and any type of discrimination based on sexual orientation in the health services.
- Greater action needed to protect women’s inheritance and property rights in the face of HIV
- If more women are to avoid HIV infection, laws on inheritance and property rights should be revisited, revised or better enforced. This was one of the key messages emerging from a high-profile side-event on women’s inheritance, land and housing rights in the context of HIV, which took place yesterday, 12 March, during the 53rd session of the Commission on the Status of Women held at UN Headquarters in New York.
- HIV prevention hampered by homophobia
- Every two or three days a person is killed in Brazil in violence connected with his or her sexuality, according to Brazil’s oldest gay rights association, Grupo Gay da Bahia (GGB). In Mexico, the reported figure is nearly two a week.