The International AIDS Society held a
special event during the XVII International
AIDS Conference to celebrate its 20th
anniversary.
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

In 1981 the first cases of unusual immune system failures were identified among gay men, women and injecting drug users. Some seven years later a group of prominent scientists from around the world came together to found the International AIDS Society (IAS) – an organisation which would organise international conferences on AIDS bringing together scientists, activists, researchers, people living with HIV and others working on AIDS issues to share knowledge and experiences in responding to the epidemic.

Since this time the IAS has convened the world’s largest meetings on HIV which are now held every two years.

2008 marks the 20th anniversary of the IAS and to commemorate the last 20 years, the IAS held a special event during the XVII International AIDS Conference which is taking place in Mexico from 3-8 August 2008.

Dr Pedro Cahn, IAS President and
Co-Chair of the XVII International AIDS
Conference (left) and former IAS President
and UN Special Envoy for AIDS in Eastern
Europe and Central Asia Professor Lars O.
Kallings.
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

The event brought together a number of past IAS Presidents, including Dr Peter Piot, UNAIDS Executive Director and Founding President of the IAS, and UN Special Envoy for AIDS in Eastern Europe and Central Asia Professor Lars O. Kallings.

Professor Kallings spoke about the IAS in the early years of the epidemic and Dr Piot looked to the future and spoke of the long term response to the epidemic. Kate Thomson, Chief of Civil Society Partnerships at UNAIDS gave a history of the involvement of people living with HIV in both the International AIDS Conference and the response to the epidemic

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met with participants from the Community Dialogue space during the official opening of the Global Village at AIDS 2008
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

At the very heart of the XVII International AIDS Conference is the Global Village, an area of over 8,000 square metres open to everyone attending AIDS 2008, including community organizations from around the world, local and national groups and the general public.

On 4 August, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UNAIDS Executive Director Dr Peter Piot officially opened the Village which for the coming week will be a space where thousands of visitors—the general public, communities living with and affected by HIV, policy-makers, researchers and other stakeholder groups—will interact and debate, share knowledge and skills, build coalitions and exchange ideas.

On 4 August, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UNAIDS Executive Director Dr Peter Piot officially opened the Village
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

The aim of the space is to enable greater civil society involvement and strengthen diverse communities’ involvement and participation in shaping the response to HIV.

Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

The shifting dynamics of the AIDS global financial architecture were explored in depth at a Special Session held on 5 August during the International AIDS Conference taking place in Mexico.

The interactive session brought together leaders from major AIDS donors and recipient countries including the United Kingdom, Ethiopia, Botswana and the Netherlands, as well as UNAIDS, WHO, the Global Fund, the World Bank, PEPFAR and civil society advocates, to reflect on the challenges posed by the current global funding architecture in delivering effective and efficient AIDS programmes.

The panelists explored the complex dynamics facing recipient governments and implementers, donor governments and other financial mechanisms, and global agencies. In the past five years, financial resources for the AIDS response have significantly increased and there has been a rapid scale-up of programming in the context of commitments to achieve universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support services by 2010. The goal is to ensure that HIV programmes are evidence-based and meet international standards, and the challenge is to “make the money work”.

Michel Sidibe, Assistant Secretary-General and UNAIDS Deputy Executive Director of Programmes
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

Michel Sidibe, Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director of Programmes, UNAIDS, discussed the challenges to ensuring that global standards are upheld as services are scaled up.

As well as advocating for the need to build adequate and sustained long-term financing for HIV programmes, Mr Sidibe spoke of the importance of strengthening health systems and improving coordination and harmonization. Mr Sidibe was instrumental in developing and implementing the “Three Ones” principles to better coordinate national AIDS responses.

The session was co-chaired by health economist Professor Jean-Paul Moatti and the Dutch AIDS Ambassador Paul Bekkers.

Participants:

Malcolm McNeil, Team Leader within the Policy and Research Division at the UK Department for International Development.

Michel Sidibe, Assistant Secretary General and Deputy Executive Director of Programmes UNAIDS

Ambassador Mark R. Dybul, United States Global AIDS Coordinator

Joy Phumaphi, Vice President of the World Bank’s Human Development Network

Alvaro Bermejo, Executive Director, International HIV/AIDS Alliance

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Minister of Health of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia

Professor Michel D. Kazatchkine, Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria

Mphu Keneiloe Ramatlapeng, Minister of Health and Social Welfare of Lesotho

Hiroki Nakatani, Assistant Director-General - HIV/AIDS, TB, Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases, World Health Organization

President of Mexico, Felipe de Jesús
Calderón Hinojosa at the opening of XVII
International AIDS Conference, Mexico City.
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

With great celebration and a characteristically warm Latin American welcome, the XVII International AIDS Conference opened on Sunday 3 August in Mexico City. Thousands of delegates from all over the world will spend the next week participating in conference sessions, satellite meetings, exhibitions as well as the Global Village and a wide cultural programme.

The event, the largest AIDS conference in the world, is held every two years and in 2008 for the first time it is taking place in the Latin America region.

The opening event included welcoming remarks by AIDS 2008 Co-Chairs, Dr Pedro Cahn and Dr Luís Soto Ramírez and addresses by high level dignitaries including Dr José Ángel Córdoba Villalobos, Secretary of Health, Mexico; Dr María Teresa Fernández de la Vega, First Vice President of Spain and Minister of the Presidency; Dr Denzil Douglas, Prime Minister of St. Kitts and Nevis and President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa, President of Mexico.

Secretary General of United
Nations, Ban Ki-Moon also
addressed the opening ceremony
of AIDS 2008.Credit:
UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

Representing the United Nations, Secretary General of United Nations, Ban Ki-Moon; Executive Director of UNAIDS Dr Peter Piot and Director General of World Health Organization Dr Margaret Chan also addressed the opening ceremony.

Twelve-year old Keren Dunaway-González from Honduras gave the Youth Welcome address and the Community Welcome was by Mony Pen from Cambodia

The opening of the XVII International AIDS Conference also featured the Red Ribbon Award Recipients and entertainment by the Mexican Folk Ballet Amalia Hernández and the music group “HIV is not a rock band!” and was broadcast live in Global Village.

World leaders and HIV experts join community activists

The conference theme, Universal Action Now! emphasizes the need for continued urgency and action on the part of all involved in the worldwide response to AIDS.

Executive Director of UNAIDS Dr Peter Piot
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

AIDS 2008 is convened by the International AIDS Society. Local partners include the Federal Government of Mexico, the Government of Mexico City and local scientific and community leadership. International institutional partners for AIDS 2008 include: Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, and its cosponsors, the World Health Organization and World Food Programme; International Council of AIDS Service Organizations; Global Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS /International Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS; World YWCA; and the Asian Harm Reduction Network.

Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

At the conclusion of the 1st Meeting of Ministers of Education and Health to prevent HIV in Latin America and the Caribbean, Ministers of Education and Health have signed an historic declaration pledging to provide comprehensive sex education as part of the school curriculum in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Ministerial Declaration

The Ministers committed to promoting concrete actions for HIV prevention among young people in their countries by implementing sex education and sexual health promotion programmes.

The sex education programmes will cover a broad range of topics including biological information, social and cultural information with discussion on gender, diversity of sexual orientation and identity along with ethics and human rights.

The Declaration also recognized the responsibility of the State to promote human development, including education and health, as well as to combat discrimination.

Promoting sexual health to impact HIV prevention

The meeting took place on 1 August 2008 and was co-hosted by Dr. José Ángel Córdova Villalobos (MÉxico), Minister of Health and Lic. Josefina Vázquez Mota (Mexico), Minister of Public Education in collaboration with Canciller Patricia Espinosa Cantellano (MÉxico), Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

UNAIDS Executive Director Dr Peter Piot and UNFPA Executive Director, Dr Thoraya Ahmed Obaid delivered an address on HIV prevention on behalf of the UN System.

The Ministerial meeting was preceded by a technical meeting held on 31 July. Advisors to the Ministers of Health and Education, technical experts from UN agencies, academics and civil society representatives discussed a broad range of issues around comprehensive sexuality education and HIV prevention.

Discussions took place in three regional working groups and included analysis of the barriers to strengthening sexuality education and sexual health promotion programmes and how to enhance collaboration between the Ministries of Health and Education.

Bishop Mark Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and president of the Lutheran World Federation, washes the feet of two HIV positive women during the August 1 plenary of the Ecumenical Pre-Conference. On the right is Herlyn Marja Uiras, of Churches United Against HIV and AIDS in Southern and Eastern Africa. Third from right is Sophie Dilmitis, HIV and AIDS coordinator for the World YWCA. Between the two women is Nyaradzai Gumbonzvanda, general secretary of the World YWCA.
Credit: Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance

Engaging in an act of “humility and repentance,” a world church leader began his presentation to an international ecumenical AIDS conference by washing the feet of two women living with HIV.

The Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), Chicago, and president of the Lutheran World Federation, Geneva, washed the feet of Herlyn Marja Uiras of Churches United Against HIV and AIDS in Southern and Eastern Africa and Sophie Dilmitis of World YWCA, Geneva.

Hanson was part of a plenary session addressing stigmatization and discrimination against people living with HIV. He said washing the womens’ feet was the only way he could begin his remarks with integrity.

“I am absolutely convinced that we as religious leaders and we in the religious community that so shunned and shamed people with HIV and struggling with AIDS … must begin first by engaging in public acts of repentance. Because absent public acts of repentance, I fear our words will not be trusted,” he said.

Following the act of repentance, a delegation of religious leaders from the Ecumenical pre-conference went to the Positive Leadership Summit “Living 2008” to share this with the delegates. The religious leaders were warmly received and joined the closing reception of the conference. Delegates from “Living 2008” sent a message to the faith based leaders, conveyed to the closing plenary by members of INERELA+, the International Network of Religious Leaders Living with or Personally Affected by HIV and AIDS:

“What we most want is simply to be accepted rather than tolerated
Accepted as people living with HIV
Accepted as men who have sex with men
Accepted as people who use drugs
Accepted as people who want families and can be responsible parents
Accepted for who we are.”

The three-day Ecumenical pre-conference was held under the theme of "Faith in Action Now!" and took place in Mexico City on 31 July - 2 August 2008. Approaching 500 participants from all over the world explored the challenges posed by HIV and the AIDS epidemic to people of faith, evaluated action taken, and planned strategies required in the Christian response to HIV and AIDS.

UNAIDS Senior Partnership Adviser Pauline Muchina made a number of presentations and Sally Smith UNAIDS Partnership Adviser led a workshop for faith-based organizations (FBOs) in collaboration with the Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance, on engaging with the recently drafted UNAIDS strategy on Religion and FBOs.

The Ecumenical Pre-conference is just one of several faith-related events in the run up to and during this year’s International AIDS Conference taking place in Mexico City.

On 2 August an evening celebration took place to mark 5 years of advocacy in Africa by ANERELA+, the African Network of Religious Leaders Living with and Personally Affected by HIV and AIDS, and to mark the formal launch of INERELA+. The network is based on the power of religion to promote human rights and positive social change. It seeks to be a global movement to challenge HIV-related silence, stigma and discrimination and to advocate for evidence-based prevention and treatment for all.

The Inaugural Summit of Religious Leaders Living with HIV begins on 3 August. It will provide a space for people living with HIV who are religious leaders to discuss their priorities and future plans for a High Level Meeting of Religious Leaders. The summit will concentrate on three topics: overcoming stigma and discrimination; living positively with HIV and mobilizing and empowering faith communities and other religious leaders. INERELA+ will bring together around 50 faith leaders who live with HIV, from a wide variety of faith traditions and countries.

Coalition of First Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin America on Women and AIDS made a personal tribute to Dr Peter Piot in recognition of his committed work on women and AIDS
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

The 5th Meeting of the Coalition of First Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin America on Women and AIDS was opened on 2 August 2008 by Mrs. Margarita Zavala, wife of the President of Mexico, First Lady of Mexico

The meeting brought together more than 150 participants, women leaders and activists from across Latin America, who discussed the challenges related to the feminization of the epidemic and possible HIV prevention strategies. They shared their different country experiences from Guatemala, Peru, Costa Rica, Argentina and Mexico.

Eight First Ladies of Latin America participated in the meeting including Mrs. Vivian Fernández de Torrijos, First Lady of Panamá and Mrs Xiomara Castro de Zelaya, First Lady of Honduras and President of the Coalition of First Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin America on Women and AIDS.

Women and AIDS

The “2008 report on the global AIDS epidemic” reported that increasing numbers of women are becoming infected with HIV in several countries in Latin America, including Argentina, Brazil, Peru, and Uruguay.

The effects of gender inequality and violence leave women and girls more at risk of exposure to HIV. Less access to education and economic opportunity results in women being more dependent on men in their relationships, and many who have no means of support must resort to bartering or selling sex to support themselves and their children.

(from left) Margaret Chan of WHO and Thoraya Obaid of UNFPA during the Fifth Meeting of the Coalition of First Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin America on Women and AIDS on 2 August 2008.
Credit: UNAIDS/agencialibrefoto

Women and girls are also at increased risk for HIV infection biologically. In unprotected heterosexual intercourse women are twice as likely as men to acquire HIV from an infected partner. Economic and social dependence on men often limits women's power to refuse sex or to negotiate the use of condoms.

Coalition of First Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin America on Women and AIDS

In order to address the impact of HIV on women and girls in Latin America, the Coalition was set up in 2006 under the leadership of the First Lady of Honduras, Mrs. Xiomara Castro de Zelaya, to promote political commitment and mobilization of regional and national resources to strengthen and enhance HIV prevention, treatment and care services and reduce the impact of the epidemic on women and girls. The Coalition is also concerned at the gaps between the genders in terms of access to HIV prevention, testing, treatment and care services.

Members of the Latin America Coalition include women leaders from the ICW (International Community of Women Living with HIV). The Coalition is committed to working in partnership with women living with HIV and adopted the 2006 Panama Declaration "Nothing for us, without us”, as the basis of their regional action plan.

This Declaration was adopted at the 1st Latin America and Caribbean Congress of Women and Girls and sets out the commitment that the AIDS response must include people living with HIV working along side the most powerful forces uniting all nations and harmonizing their mutual concern and identities.

The 5th Meeting of the Coalition of First
Ladies and Women Leaders of Latin
America on Women and AIDS was
opened on 2 August 2008

At the conclusion of the meeting, the Coalition approved a statement on Women and AIDS in which they commit to work closely with community leaders and continue to advocate for stopping the feminization of the epidemic and eradicating the social, cultural and economic constraints that affect women, girls and teenagers.

They also highlighted the importance of supporting people living with or at higher risk of HIV and to speak out against discrimination and violence towards women and girls.

Executive Director of UNAIDS Dr Peter Piot delivered a speech on the international response to the impact of the HIV epidemic on women and the Coalition made a personal tribute to him in recognition of his committed work on women and AIDS.

President George W. Bush is joined by Annette Lantos, right, and invited guests Wednesday, July 30, 2008 in the East Room of the White House, as he signs H.R. 5501, the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008. White House photo by Joyce N. Boghosian.

On 30 July 2008, US President George W. Bush signed the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008. This legislation replaces and extends the existing act by five years and also expands it three-fold to US$ 48 billion.

A number of guests joined President Bush in the White House for this historic event. They included senior members of the US House and the US Senate and Congressional and agency staff as well as family members of the politicians Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde in whose memory the act honours.

President Bush expressed his appreciation to Dr Peter Piot, UNAIDS Executive Director for attending and thanked him and Rajat Gupta, the Chairman of the Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria for their presence.

(left to right) Dr Peter Piot, UNAIDS Executive Director and Michele Moloney-Kitts, Assistant U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator at the White House on the day U.S. President George W. Bush signed the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008, 30 July 2008

Dr Peter Piot paid tribute to the leadership of the President and the US Congress: “The generosity of the US government has helped to truly transform the global response to AIDS and the course of the epidemic. It has enabled all of us to make a qualitative and quantum leap forward.”

President Bush acknowledged that AIDS is a long-term crisis that will require serious commitment and resources for decades: “Defeating HIV/AIDS once and for all will require an unprecedented investment over generations. But it is an investment that yields the best possible return: saved lives.”

President Bush first announced the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) in a State of the Union address in 2003 and a US$ 15 billion act was passed by US Congress that same year.

Joining the President on the occasion of the signing of the reauthorization, were two people directly benefiting from PEPFAR. Agnes Nyamayarwo, from Uganda, who now travels extensively educating people about HIV and Mohamad Kalyesubula, who works in a clinic caring for HIV positive people.

Latest figures show that after decades of increasing mortality, the annual number of AIDS deaths globally has declined in the past two years, in part as a result of greater access to HIV treatment.

Deborah Williams, Chair of the Global Network of People Living with HIV and AIDS (GNP+) (left) and Dr Peter Piot, UNAIDS Executive Director at opening of Living 2008
Credit: UNAIDS/Agencialibre Fotografía

UNAIDS Executive Director delivers plenary speech at Summit opening.
350 HIV-positive global leaders and advocates from 88 countries have come together to discuss a range of issues in the AIDS reposnse impacting people living with HIV worldwide.
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Kate Thomson, Chief of Civil Society
Partnerships at UNAIDS

30 July 2008

Kate Thomson is Chief of Civil Society Partnerships at UNAIDS. She has been involved in AIDS activism for over twenty years - firstly in the UK, where she helped set up the first positive women's organization - and then internationally through work with the international people living with HIV conferences, the Global Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (GNP+) and the International Community of Women living with HIV (ICW). She is also a founder member of UN+. 

Ahead of the Positive Leadership Summit which will begin in Mexico City on 31 July, unaids.org asked Kate to reflect on the changing leadership role of the global positive community and today’s outstanding issues.

Kate, you have been involved in AIDS activism for many years, what progress have you seen over this time?

The changes are phenomenal. Back when I first got involved in early 1987 there was a lot less hope. There were far fewer positive activists and the vast majority were northern gay men - almost no positive women were involved. We were determined to do something – to ask questions and demand answers, to push for better services and support, better science and treatment that worked, to push for policies that protected us against the discrimination and human rights violations that our friends were experiencing on a daily basis. This is still the reality for many people living with HIV (PLHIV) around the world.

However, for a fortunate and relative few, we are alive to see the results of our activism, receiving the services we were fighting for, and becoming increasingly involved in creating the policies in our countries and globally. Furthermore, over the years, we have seen more activists from the South become involved in global advocacy. Holding the PLHIV conferences outside of Europe was an important step in recognizing and encouraging this process.

The 2001 UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS (UNGASS) and the Declaration of Commitment provided our communities with a tool with which to hold our governments accountable and strongly articulated the necessity of creating partnerships with PLHIV and other key populations. The establishment of the Global Fund gave us the means to raise and distribute far larger amounts of money for AIDS (and TB and malaria) than we’d ever have imagined a short time before.

Most of the activism that happens occurs at grassroots level and seldom gets acknowledged at the international level or feeds into global policy discussions. This is one of the greatest weaknesses and challenges that the global PLHIV movement faces. Strengthening those links between the local, regional and global levels is something that will continue to be an ongoing struggle for PLHIV networks in the foreseeable future.

The LIVING 2008 Positive Leadership Summit will begin on 31 July in advance of the XVII International AIDS Conference. Can you tell us about the significance of this event?

Given the current climate where the rights of PLHIV are being eroded in many areas, where there is a growing complacency among donors regarding scaling up towards universal access and a false perception that the AIDS crisis is over, its essential that PLHIV come together and, as the title of the Summit states, reclaim the advocacy agenda for ourselves rather than continue to let others define some of the most critical issues we are facing.

It’s important that we can go into the International AIDS conference with a revitalized collective voice around these issues and that we are able reenergize the debate once we return to work with local positive communities in our countries.

What are the priority issues for the movement of people living with HIV?

Well, if you look at the agenda for the Leadership Summit you will see four main issues highlighted.

1. Universal access to HIV treatment, care and prevention programmes
2. Positive Prevention
3. Sexual and reproductive health and rights of people living with HIV
4. Criminalization of the transmission of HIV

Cross cutting issues include leadership, women and most at-risk groups, while overarching issues will include addressing gender inequality, increasing involvement of young people living with HIV; stigma and discrimination; the greater involvement of people living with HIV (GIPA); and creating effective partnerships.

The list is of course not exhaustive. For instance, some of the other issues of great concern to the PLHIV movement include: the fact that some governments are turning their backs on commitments made around universal access; that we still need to ensure adequate funding for AIDS programming and that the money raised reaches the populations most in need; that funding for health systems should not be pitted against funding for AIDS; and that broader human rights issues affecting PLHIV and key populations are addressed and protected.

People living with HIV are increasingly recognized as a vital part of global and local HIV responses. Is GIPA (the greater involvement of people living with HIV) actually happening?

A lot of lip service has been paid to the greater or more meaningful involvement of PLHIV in the response but in reality progress is slow. In the early days just being openly living with HIV was sometimes seen as enough reason to invite someone to the table. But what is clear now is that relevant skills and professionalism are essential or otherwise our presence is tokenistic. The lack of meaningful participation at country level due to lack of capacity of PLHIV networks is a common problem. For this reason, it’s essential that the involvement of PLHIV in all aspects of the response be adequately funded. This must include training in all technical areas, including policy work.

What unites the positive community, transcending all borders and backgrounds? Is there such as a thing as a shared strategy within the global PLHIV movement?

Of course just because we are living with HIV doesn’t make us all agree on everything!

However, there are some experiences that do create a unique bond. I’d say I have a special relationship with those PLHIV who I’ve known since the mid 1980s. We may disagree, but it’s like a family that’s been through tremendous pain and loss, but also survived and collectively achieved so much in spite of the odds. For this reason we will always be linked.

If you think about the global PLHIV movement, although we are talking about massively larger numbers of individuals involved, some of those elements are still there. Shared common experience of real or perceived stigma, of fear of illness and dying, of collectively fighting for something you believed in – and a tremendous will to live and enjoy life to the full. These are all common threads that weave in and out of our lives.

When it comes down to holding particular positions on issues such as testing, positive prevention and so on it’s less easy to achieve consensus, but nonetheless, I think the overall commitment to upholding the human rights of PLHIV is a uniting factor – as is the belief in universal access to prevention, treatment, care and support.

What is UNAIDS participation in the event?

UNAIDS is a member of the Living Partnership, a group of organizations who are committed to the right of PLHIV to self determination and that the meaningful involvement of those living with HIV in the AIDS response is crucial to its success.

UNAIDS staff members have participated on the working groups organizing this event and media from day one. Several of us attended the planning meeting for Living 2008 that took place in Monaco in January of this year hosted by HSH Princess Stephanie of Monaco (a UNAIDS Special Representative) and Fight AIDS Monaco.

During the event our Executive Director Peter Piot will speak at the opening plenary and Special Representative HSH Princess Stephanie will address the meeting through a video message.

For all of us, being a part of this event has been a priority – leadership of people living with HIV is obviously an issue close to our hearts as PLHIV, but also a priority for the UNAIDS programme as a whole.

Finally, what are your hopes for the future? What would you like to see on the agenda of “Living 2018”?

By 2018 I hope we will be talking about effective vaccines and microbicides and new and effective drugs for TB and hepatitis C as well as for HIV.

I hope that the stigma that surrounds HIV will no longer exist — that discrimination doesn’t continue killing people just because they are somehow different and that GIPA will be a redundant concept.

I hope it will no longer be necessary to hold these meetings, that AIDS activism will be a thing of the past and that we will all have moved on to new areas of work – but this is probably far too wishful thinking.

Ahead of AIDS 2008, a two day forum being
held in Mexico will focus on men who have
sex with men and HIV.

The up-coming XVII International AIDS Conference (IAC) begins 3 August in Mexico City. It is the first time that the world’s largest HIV forum is being held in Latin America giving the opportunity for regional HIV issues to be highlighted.

No single factor impacting the epidemic in Latin America is more in need of focus than men who have sex with men (MSM). At least a quarter of HIV infections in the region are related to sex between men but social taboos largely prevent sustained discussion on the issue and have inhibited efforts to promote safer sexual relations.

In particular, unprotected sex between men is an important factor in the epidemics of Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Peru in South America, as well as in several Central American countries, including El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama.

Against this background a pre-conference affiliated event “The Invisible Men: Gay Men and other MSM in the Global HIV/AIDS Epidemic”, will be hosted by Global Forum on MSM and HIV on 1-2 August in Mexico City.

The Global Forum on MSM and HIV

The Global Forum on Men Who Have Sex with Men and HIV was first convened at the 2006 International AIDS Conference in Toronto. It is a network of civil society groups, AIDS organizations, MSM groups and other agencies that works at global and national levels to advocate for improved HIV programming specifically for MSM. The Forum was formed in response to a shared concern that current HIV strategies do not adequately address the needs of men who have sex with men and that the gaps are due to persistent denial and human rights abuses.

“Across the world, effective HIV responses meeting the needs of men who have sex with men have been neglected. Today there is a real willingness to start to overcome that quarter of a century of neglect, and the Global Forum and this meeting will give a strong focus where and how action is most urgent,” Michael Bartos, UNAIDS Prevention Chief.

The two day forum will focus on coordinating a response to the large gaps in funding and services that currently exist for MSM living with and at risk for HIV and call for a scale up HIV funding and human rights protections for men who have sex with men. UNAIDS Executive Director Dr Peter Piot will address the forum.

Human rights and social justice are key to the health and well being of men who have sex with men and other sexual and gender minorities. Stigma and discrimination contributes to the spread of HIV by creating a culture of secrecy and shame that makes it difficult to effectively educate communities on risk behaviours.