It’s World Aids day.

Until September last year I’d never met people I knew had HIV/ AIDS. On a story gathering trip to Tanzania, I went from being semi illiterate about HIV/AIDS to meeting it face to face.

In the villages of Dodoma, I met people whose lives are affected by it. Young girls no older than 20, no mothers with toddlers, some are HIV positive, others feel conscripted to lives of poverty because they have family members infected.

The words of one of the girls i met still rings in my head, ‘HIV brings poverty.’ I thought her remark was stark and very poignant and it was clear that living with HIV for some people is being trapped in a cycle.

For her, it was her father. He was always too weak to work, so the family farm – a relatively small patch of land  had to be manned by herself and her brother, she’d had to drop out of school, her hopes of becoming a nurse dashed, and she’s got to fend for her family of 8.

There are many myths and facts about HIV that isn’t common knowledge. It’s easy to assume we know what it is, but sometimes hearing the stories of those who have been affected by it, helps to place a face to the infection. Perhaps then there may be less stigmatisation. World Aids Day has an excellent website with case studies and the dash the myths of HIV/AIDS effectively http://www.worldaidsday.org/hivreality/common-myths.aspx

No one ever hopes to have HIV/AIDS or to even know someone affected by it, but it does happen and it’s not partial. The key thing to remember is promiscuity is the common denominator in the story of HIV/AIDS. It’s a shame that the message of abstinence isn’t encouraged when talking to young people- especially in schools – about it, rather it’s all about strapping up and having ‘safe sex’. 

The Bible Society of Tanzania has the thankless and somewhat controversial job of visiting villages in Tanzania and educating people about HIV/AIDS. They visit areas most other charities don’t reach, and teach on what the Bible has to say about it.

The story of the Good Samaritan is a winner when it comes to teaching this message, and the response to its message has transformed many communities.

I was truly challenged by the family i met that’s living with it, dealing with issues of extra-marital affairs, poverty, unemployment, illness, teen pregnancy and on top of that being stigmatised by their neighbours. They are still the most genuine family i’ve ever met – open about their shortcomings, passionate about helping those like themselves and optimistic about their future.

For people affected, hearing the local vicar preach about acceptance and against stigma goes a long way, for some, it means being able to walk down the streets with their heads held high. You can find out more about how people respond to this programme at http://www.biblesociety.org.uk/about-bible-society/what-we-do-around-the-world/responding-to-hiv-aids

So it’s World Aids day… it’s a HIV free day for me, unfortunately millions of people will never be able to say that.

By Jennifer Browning

For World AIDS Day today, Project Medishare will have a memorial in remembrance of those who have succumbed to the disease. The memorial will take place in Casse/Lahoye. Following the memorial, four small group sessions will be held in four densely populated areas. This afternoon various youth groups will perform presentations involving theater and dance. The youth presentations will focus on the stigmatization of HIV/AIDS, as well as abstinence and faithfulness. Education materials along with condoms will be distributed throughout the day.

Last year during World AIDS Day, Project Medishare received a $1.25 million grant through the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). The award, which focuses on HIV/AIDS prevention activities, is part of a $4.8 million grant to Cross International, a South Florida-based interdenominational Christian humanitarian agency.
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Project Medishare, as part of the PEPFAR program, has enrolled 250 children from all regions of LaHoye. The children receive health services, psychosocial support, birth certificates to orphans and vulnerable children, as well as training for caregivers on parenting, health and other topics. In addition to providing these services, through the PEPFAR grant, Project Medishare provides financial support for People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) in order to help them start micro enterprise and other income generating activities.

Thus far, we have provided 49 children with primary school tuition and 34 children with birth certificates. Thanks to the PEPFAR program, 10 individuals have publicly declared their HIV positive status. In response to this, Project Medishare has started a PLWHA support group with these individuals which is slowly growing to more members.

In order to provide education regarding HIV/AIDS, Project Medishare hired and trained 16 peer educators to educate and mobilize the local youth. In addition, 10 health promoters from various locations in LaHoye have been trained to educate, mobilize community members as well as elected officials in the fight against HIV/AIDS.

**This report is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of Cross International and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.

South Africa’s president says his government will expand testing and treatment for the HIV/AIDS virus that afflicts an estimated 5.7 million people in his country… From VOA. Full story

This site may contain information about: virus. The blog is also related to: virus.

A few weeks ago, in a movie theatre, a person felt something poking from her seat. When she got up to see what it was, she found a needle sticking out of the seat with a note attached saying

“You have just been infected by HIV”.

The Disease Control Center (in Paris ) reports many similar events in many other cities recently. All tested needles were HIV Positive..

The Center also reports that needles have been found in cash dispensers at public banking machines. We ask everyone to use extreme caution when faced with this kind of situation. All public  hairs/seats should be inspected withvigilance and caution before use. A careful visual inspection should be enough. In addition, they ask that each of you pass this message along to all members of your family and your friends of the potential danger.

Recently, one doctor has narrated a somewhat similar instance that hppened to one of his patients at the Priya Cinema in Delhi . A young girl, engaged and about to be married in a couple of months, was pricked while the movie was going on. The tag with the needle had the message

“Welcome to the World of HIV family”.

Though the doctors told her family that it takes about 6 months before the virus grows strong enough to start damaging the system and a healthy victim could survive about 5-6 years,the girl died in 4 months, perhaps more because of the “Shock thought”.
We all have to be careful at public places, rest God help! Just think about saving a life byforwarding this message. Please, take a few seconds of your time to pass along.

To mark its fifth anniversary, the New York Buyers’ Club has prepared a special edition of SUPPLEMENT. In it you will find a concise Guide to managing and preventing HIV medication side effects with supplements and other complementary and alternative therapies.

This is an invaluable introduction to how nutritional supplements can be used to counter those side effects that can make life miserable–or even disrupt treatment adherence–in people taking antiretroviral medications for HIV.

Read about approaches to dealing with diarrhea, nausea, heart health issues, diabetes, insomnia, fatigue, liver stress, lipodystrophy, anxiety and depression.

This FREE Guide is available online at:

http://newyorkbuyersclub.org/

On the NYBC website you can also SUBSCRIBE to the nonprofit co-op’s quarterly FREE newsletter, THE SUPPLEMENT, which continues to offer a unique perspective on current evidence-based use of supplements for chronic conditions including cardiovascular disease, diabetes/insulin resistance, hepatitis and other liver conditions, anxiety/depression, osteoarthritis, cognitive and neurorological issues, and gastrointestinal dysfunction.

Canadian Politics

• An independent report released Friday, details the rising numbers of Aboriginal offenders, and the growing number of Aboriginal women in the Canadian penal system. Aboriginal women and men continue to be over-represented in Canadian prisons, are given longer sentences, and fare significantly worse when they are released. The report suggests that the Correctional Service of Canada has not done enough to ensure that Aboriginal offenders are given sufficient opportunity to access culturally-sensitive programming and safely return to their communities.

American Politics

• This article discusses the Stupak-Pitts amendment to the US Healthcare Reform Bill; to secure passage of this legislation in the House, the Democrats have chosen a course that risks the well-being of millions of women for generations to come. In response to this, more than three dozen House Democrats have signed a letter to House Leader Nancy Pelosi firmly pledging to vote against the bill if it contains an anti-choice amendment.

Reproductive Choice

• In the midst of the Stupak-Pitts amendment debate in the United States, it has been reported that the Republican National Committee has covered abortion in its employee’s health plan since 1991. However in response to the backlash they received the RNC announced today that it will no longer offer a health plan that includes abortion coverage.

Gendered Violence

• This week the Canadian Labour Congress announced their upcoming post card campaign to mark the 20th anniversary of the massacre at École Polytechnique and call on the Prime Minister to take action on ending violence against women.
• This week, B.C. Attorney-General Mike de Jong said that a public inquiry into the Highway of Tears investigations is possible, but the first priority is solving the 18 cases of missing and murdered women found along this stretch of highway.

Economic Crisis

• A gendered perspective on the recession reveals that some women—namely those who were poor and disempowered to begin with—have fallen further behind as workers, mothers, and community members. The Center for American Progress reports that unmarried women have been hit from all sides by job loss, the foreclosure epidemic, and the health care crisis.

Health

• This Monday, the World Health Organization (WHO), an agency of the United Nations, released its first-ever study of women’s health worldwide. The study, (found here,) reported that H.I.V. is the leading cause of death and disease among women between the ages of 15 and 44.

International

• 50 women who called themselves the Lioness group became the first female graduates of Iraq’s police officer training academy.
• The number of women in Eastern Europe and Central Asia dying from complications in childbirth and pregnancy has dramatically dropped by more than 50% over the last 10 years.
• This week the head of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) discussed on a tour in Mali, the negative consequences climate change will have on the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people.
• Malalai Joya, the youngest woman ever elected to Afghanistan’s parliament, was in Vancouver this weekend to speak and launch a book tour for her new memoir, A Woman Among Warlords. She is currently touring Canada, to see other tour dates click here.
• Indian election authorities granted what they called an independent identity to intersex and transsexuals in the country’s voter lists.
• A report release by UNICEF this week has shown that a third of deaths in children under five in developing countries are linked to poor diet. It also revealed 195million children – one in three - have stunted growth.

Today is World AIDS Day. It’s a day to raise awareness about the problem of HIV/AIDS around the world.

HIV/AIDS is an awful disease that has killed millions of people all over the world. Like other countries in Africa, it is especially bad in Sudan. There are over 320,000 people who are infected with the disease. What’s worse is that there are 25,000 children between the ages of 0 and 14 who have HIV/AIDS in Sudan.

With little access to medical treatment, one of the best ways that we can fight this disease is through education. If we teach people how to read and write, and give them access to information, we can help them learn how to protect themselves from HIV/AIDS. That’s one more reason why what we’re doing is so important!

So let’s raise some money to help build some schools. It just might save a few lives in Sudan!

The theme for World AIDS Day 2009 is “Universal Access and Human Rights” Understanding HIV and AIDS from a human rights perspective can be difficult. Human rights are often misunderstood – and can sometimes be seen as abstract ideals with not much practical relevance for real people. With “Universal Access and Human Rights” being the theme of this year’s World AIDS Day, the key slogans are:

 I am accepted.

I am safe.

I am getting treatment.

I am well.

I am living my rights.

Everyone deserves to live their rights. Right to Live. Right to Health. Access for all to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support is a critical part of human rights.

source: un.org

Today, I put food into buckets at the J. L. Zwane Centre. For the longest time, I filled plastic bag after plastic bag with 15 pieces of candy. Sometimes I counted out the fifteen pieces, and dropped them into bags Mom was holding open. But mostly, I selected pieces carefully from a huge pile that was mounded in front of me and then dropped them one by one into the bag she held open. (I ate candy, too! Pastor Mel said it was okay!) But after a while, I thought that job was boring. So next, I followed Dad between the rows and rows of buckets. I added bags of sugar, bags of rice, cans of fish, and (whispering to Daddy: I can’t remember?) oh yeah! And cans of beans. Each bucket got two cans of fish and two cans of beans. Knowing I might not be interested in the same task for too long, Mommy asked if I would help her clean up by picking up empty plastic bags that were originally wrapped around the flour and sugar sacks. After cleaning up, I played with Abe and my friend, Ethan. Whew! It was another busy day for us at the Zwane Centre.

Live Nation the world’s largest live concert producer, is stepping out this World Aids Day to lend support to a fight for a cure.

The company has agreed to donate a portion of their proceeds from every ticket sold to its concerts in the United States to fight HIV/AIDS.  All proceeds will benefit the music industry’s premier HIV/AIDS prevention charity in America, LIFEbeat.

The company, who was responsible for Jay-Z’s 9/11 benefit concert, is especially excited to stand alongside the music industry’s most prevalent prevention charity.

President and CEO of Live Nation, Michael Rapino, expressed the sentiments of himself and his company in a statement saying.

“We are proud to stand alongside LIFEbeat on World AIDS Day to help educate music fans about prevention of this deadly disease.”

You can purchase concert tickets at LiveNation.com to Live Nation events beginning at 12:01 a.m. December 1^st when a portion of every ticket sold will benefit LIFEbeat.

HIV/AIDS is most prevalent in the Black community with Blacks making up 51% of new HIV/AIDS cases. The best way to protect yourself against the virus is abstinence but if you are sexually active, through the use of latex and polyurethane barrier methods such as male and female condoms .

Washington D.C. currently has the highest HIV rate in the country with 3 percent of individuals in the city testing positive for the virus. For every 100,000 people tested in D.C. 3,000 of them are infected, a rate higher than that of West Africa.

We’ve all seen firsthand the effects of the virus. In the 90s the Hip-Hop world was stunned when the late Eazy E died from the disease just ten days after being admitted to the hospital.

AIDS is real and it’s not going away anytime soon. Do yourself and your partners a favor and get tested, AIDS is no joke.

Today is World AIDS Day and while we are considerably better off with information and technology now than we first were at the advent of this illness, please take a moment and send your collective energies to those who are currently suffering and to those who have lost a friend, family member or close confidant to HIV/AIDS. No matter the progression, the stigma that comes with HIV/AIDS is hurtful. Understanding the facts is key to fighting prejudice and promoting education. One of my best friends is HIV positive. If putting a face to the stigma helps you to fight judgment in favor of compassion, take a look around. HIV/AIDS affects us all.  Please reflect and remember on this day and always.

International Statistics:

People living with HIV:
* 33.4 million people living with HIV worldwide
* 31.3 million adults
* 15.7 million women
* 2.1 million children under 15

New cases in 2008:
* 2.7 million people
* 2.3 million adults
* 430,000 children under 15

HIV-related deaths:
* 2 million total deaths

For more information, visit: www.worldaidsday.org

For even more information:

Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS

International AIDS Society

ps:  Thanks, Twitter & Google

Today marks the 21st annual observance of World AIDS Day. The global community is marking the day with calls to action, and efforts to heighten awareness:

• US News & World Report says that “2009 could prove to be a watershed year in terms of advances in [HIV] prevention and treatment” (US News & World Report)
• President Jacob Zuma has announced a major policy shift for South Africa (the country with the highest number of people living with HIV): “South Africa will treat all HIV-positive babies and expand testing” (Associated Press)
• Getty CEO Jonathan Klein weighs in on the power of images in combating stigma surrounding AIDS (Huffington Post)
• The U.S. continues to fund the fight against AIDS in Vietnam, where stigma around the disease is still very strong (Dallas Morning News)
• Family members of HIV-positive patients are applauding the lifting of the U.S.’s 22-year-old HIV travel ban (Chicago Tribune)
• In India, new HIV infections are down by about 100,000/year (Sify News)
• Organizations including the San Antonio AIDS Foundation are working to meet the needs of homeless Americans living with HIV/AIDS (San Antonio News)
• After bringing HIV/AIDS education to a Pittsburgh juvenile detention center, Schweitzer Fellow Meredith Dixon traveled to the Schweitzer Hospital in Africa and helped to establish a pediatric HIV treatment program (Beyond Boulders)

by Naomi Njoki Nyaga as told to ChildFund Kenya

On the occasion of World AIDS Day, Naomi, who lives in the Kiambu District of Kenya’s Central Province, agreed to share her story. The 37-year-old widowed mother of four children, Naomi and her youngest child are HIV-positive. She and her children are enrolled in the ChildFund Weaving the Safety Net program for orphans and other vulnerable children, which has delivered medical care and support to the family. This year’s theme for World AIDS Day is Universal Access and Human Rights. Today and tomorrow, Naomi shares her story.

Having lost my husband to HIV/AIDS in the year 2005, I knew it was just a matter of time before the same fate befell me, as I had also been diagnosed and tested HIV-positive.

I lost hope of living the day my husband was buried.

Back then, HIV/AIDS was considered a death sentence in my village. I had attended countless burials and had no doubt in my mind my day was imminent.

Depressed and Ill
My health started deteriorating very fast. I sunk into a serious depression. The whole situation would have been bearable with support from those around me, specifically my relatives, but it wasn’t so. They avoided us like a plague. I would spend days without anyone visiting me, despite them knowing how much I needed their support. Some even avoided a simple handshake. I felt such a social misfit. I begun to hate myself, and bitterness was slowly consuming me.

A Ray of Hope
When I thought all was lost, I encountered a local community-based organization (CBO) —Kihara Widows, a ChildFund partner in the Weaving the Safety Net for Orphans and other Vulnerable Children (WSN/OVC) program which understood my circumstances. In 2006, my children were enrolled in the program, which made me feel some weight had been lifted off my shoulders. My firstborn son, who had lost hope of going to high school, was enabled to do so. My other three children also became beneficiaries of the various interventions in WSN program.

Naomi and her youngest child are HIV-positive but living positively.

The kind visitors from Kihara Widows CBO, who were now becoming good friends, noticed that my condition was worsening. Having been trained in home-based care they started coming to my home more frequently. Their encouragement, home-based care services and commitment made me come out of the sorry state I was in. My perception to life was different. There was a ray of hope, not just for my children but also for me. A determination to conquer started building up within me. Soon I wanted to live more than ever before, as it dawned on me that I have a right to life. Through their encouragement, I sought treatment for the opportunistic infections that had become frequent, I guess aggravated by stress, fear and anger. Soon I was put on anti-retroviral therapy.

Tomorrow: Read how Naomi is now supporting her family and helping others who face the same challenges that she has.

Today, to mark World AIDS Day, Joe, the boys, and I participated in the food parcel distribution at the J. L. Zwane Centre, sponsored by Open Arms of Minnesota. It was a special day, begun with a prayer and reflection led by Rev. Spiwo Xapile, who invited participants to name those in their hearts infected with or affected by HIV/AIDS. Some tears accompanied memories of those who have not survived. After the prayer, along with Jane Letourneau, the musical group Siyaya, and a few other friends and assistants at the Centre, we turned to the task of assembling parcels of food to give to 250 members of the Guguletu community who have been active in the J. L. Zwane HIV/AIDS support group, and who are learning to live positively with an HIV-positive diagnosis. The parcels of food, which cost U.S. $40 each, can feed a family of up to seven members for a month and are filled with high-quality and nutritious staple food items, as well as a few treats. Because the anti-retroviral medications must be taken with food, good nutrition is very important in the successful treatment of HIV/AIDS. Open Arms recognizes how the parcels of food, especially as the holidays approach, alleviate stress and hunger in households served by the Centre, freeing up whatever income families have to spend on other necessities and holiday preparations. The buckets provide a means for people to bring water back to their homes from the common water taps shared by many shack dwellers in the community. Abraham, Andy, and I assembled little baggies of candy to place in each parcel, while Joe worked with the larger team to distribute all of the groceries that were delivered to the Centre at 10:00 this morning. Abraham and Andy also were asked to check to make sure that every bucket had two bags of flour and a baggie filled with an assortment of candies.We all participated, too, in the clean-up effort before lunch was served. After lunch, we delivered a special parcel of food that we assembled at the cottage in Fish Hoek to the Inzame Zabantu clinic, to be taken to the gentleman who allowed me to shoot his photograph for 30/30. We learned he is in the hospital—so please pray for him. That is all I know at this hour. Back at the Centre, members of the support group were given their parcels of food beginning at 2:00 p.m. This is a twice-annual distribution that Open Arms sponsors, and students from St. Thomas are coming in January to participate in a third distribution for 2010. If you would like to sponsor a parcel of food to share your bounty this holiday season, please send checks in multiples of $40 made payable to Open Arms of Minnesota, specifying in the memo line: “January UST food parcel distribution.” Then, please mail them to Open Arms of Minnesota, 1414 East Franklin Avenue, Minneapolis, MN 55404. We are grateful for your commitment to the wider community in which we all live.

It’s World AIDS Day. Although my activism and identity were forged in HIV/AIDS work, I have found over the past few years that the messages of disease prevention, and of a community and identity built not around health and connection, but around serostatus, have lost the intensity and luster. And rather than bringing a world together to fight for basic health care and infrastructure, the work in the West vs. the developing world brings different standards of living, different expectations of the meaning of “basic needs”, into stark relief. I recently read something a friend wrote about why he left the field of HIV/AIDS work. My path was somewhat different, and somewhat later, but similarly it just stopped making sense to try to shock people with information that was no longer shocking. We had become a part of the nonprofit industrial complex, and were worried at least as much about raising enough money to pay for annual raises as we were about providing services to our clients. Our messages were empty, and pathologizing, and hadn’t kept pace with the times and the communities.

Still, every year on December 1st I wear red, and think of those who have passed, and remember finding my way to a community that felt like home. Though I don’t live there anymore, I wouldn’t be who I am now without it. This year’s theme is “Universal Access & Human Rights”, which I hope will be more than empty feel-good words. Tonight I’ll light my candle and be glad for the people who are in and have passed through my life. And I’ll feel lucky tomorrow when I return to my regular life and thoughts.

[december 1, 2009, world AIDS day]
richard kearns, poet advocate. here is my poem for world AIDS day, 2009. (i have given the clerk copies)

jeff was dying, i was not
a hundred karposi lesions
covered his body &
made him look like
nijinsky in afternoon
with a faun, only skinny

he was my captain of
bright & stormy mornings
my saint & my man
he was my AIDS hero
(more than mine) & i
hated he was leaving me

i wanted to pour into him all
the life left to me —
because i could never hope to be
good enough to survive this plague
by myself, let alone for anyone else —
because i was cannon fodder —
because we needed him

i told him so one day

he laughed & then — i don’t
remember how — he scooped up
my tanned gym-hard bod in his pale &
thin & tangly night-scarred arms &
tender-kissed me several times saying —
here i thought i was pouring my life
into yours. why? because

i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
pass it on

then he was gone
his words do not keep
me from missing him
but they are a comfort
neither god nor quilt has
offered — my own turn
to triumph with a balm
no one else can
discover or manufacture,
invent or create or speak,
medicine compounded with my
blood & toil & tears & sweat

i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
pass it on

i have struggled to do what
jeff could not stay to finish &
sam & jim & russ & steve & the
too too many more. too too
soon your turn will come
let us make each other’s lives
more livable, more filled with sun &
season while we can. never forget

i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
i believe in you
pass it on
pass it on
pass it on

namasté

—richard kearns
(dedicated to cm bill rosendahl)
rk@aids-write.org
http://aids-write.org
http://havvacc.wordpress.com

ITEM NO. (37)
09-2824
CONTINUED CONSIDERATION OF RESOLUTION (ROSENDAHL – KORETZ) relative to declaring December 1, 2009 as WORLD AIDS DAY in the City of Los Angeles. Recommendation for Council action: RESOLVE to DECLARE December 1, 2009 as WORLD AIDS DAY in the City of Los Angeles, and call upon all the residents and leaders of this great city to join us in heightening the awareness of HIV infection and AIDS prevention and the need for accessible and available testing for all. (Continued from Council meeting of November 24, 2009)

A UNAIDS study in the year 2000 on the impact of HIV/AIDS on the Kenya predicted that the scourge would leave the Kenyan economy one-sixth smaller than it would have been in the absence of HIV/AIDS. Well, the pandemic has wreaked more havoc both on the economy as well as business.

Not only has the scourge adversely affected productivity and costs, but HIV/AIDS continues to have an invidious effect that is unquantifiable but yet profoundly impacts enterprise.

Absenteeism is usually the first and most common impact on business productivity. The number of days an employee reports to work can be measured, but this can also be a trigger for discord in labour relations when other healthy workers have to shoulder the responsibilities of the absentee.

The next impact is usually a loss of vital skills, which in turn makes entrepreneurs hesitant to invest in training for their employees. Most times, when a small business owner sponsors an employee to training they also expect that this employee will act as some sort of champion of the newly learned skill or knowledge, spreading it amongst the other employees. Thus the loss caused by AIDS doesn’t just end with the illness or death of that employee.

Finally there is the emergence of a loss of morale amongst the other staff members. What else can you expect when attending funerals of colleagues and their family members becomes a common event.

On World AIDS Day, the National AIDS Control Council should salute small businesses that take measures to protect their workers who are uninfected, whilst offering appropriate support and services to those who are infected. These are the entrepreneurs who are on the front-line fighting the scourge that threatens to shrink and sink the economy.

The government on its part could also provide incentives to small business entrepreneurs by introducing tax incentives for greater involvement in AIDS prevention.