Welcome to 2022, family!
We’re starting this year off with so much momentum from your support of our work in 2021. In what feels like an annual tradition, our communities and our work were tested last year. But faced with a year of loss and challenges, we supported one another and made huge strides together. Whether or not you’re one to create resolutions, PWN has some big resolutions we demand to see the federal government meet in its newly released National HIV/AIDS Strategy (NHAS) as it begins implementing this 5-year plan to address HIV/AIDS in the U.S.
For 2022, we resolve to continue pushing for a federal HIV/AIDS strategy that goes beyond biomedical interventions. We know our “health” is measured beyond simply viral loads or suppression. Instead, we need a strategy that understands how racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia operate, and how criminalization and capitalism compromise our quality of life, our safety, our access to quality healthcare, and our rights to sexual pleasure and reproductive justice.
This year, PWN demands the federal government’s NHAS make these 5 resolutions a reality:
- End molecular HIV surveillance (MHS), an invasive and non-consensual strategy currently used by the government, from the local to federal level
- Include the US People Living with HIV (PLHIV) Caucus in the NHAS’s creation of its Quality of Life indicator
- Meaningfully involve people living with HIV by designating seats for representatives the US PLHIV Caucus on the President’s Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS (PACHA) and other federal advisory bodies
- Commit to supporting the whole spectrum of sexual and reproductive rights of people living with HIV
- Commit to decriminalizing HIV so people living with HIV can live free from institutional stigma and discrimination
With these resolutions, we’re asking the federal government to commit to supporting people living with HIV in the ways we need. While we know 2022 will come with its own set of challenges, we continue to demand better because we deserve better.
This year we also continue to be laser focused on protecting voting rights, stopping any attempts to undermine the ACA, protecting our communities from growing threats of white supremacy, and other attempts to undermine our safety and wellbeing.
Add your name and join us in demanding the federal government commits to our 2022 #HIVResolutions!