Joint Statement from the United States People Living with HIV Caucus and HIVenas Abiertas, Positive Women’s Network-USA, Positively Trans, Sero Project, The Reunion Project and Thrive SS
Contact:
Devin Hursey, US People Living with HIV Caucus: [email protected] 816.872.2051
Octavia Lewis, Positively Trans: [email protected] 404.735.1530
Malcolm Reid, Thrive SS: [email protected] 404.202.0912
Naina Khanna, Positive Women’s Network – USA: [email protected] 510.681.1169
Dec 10, 2018: Today, on Human Rights Day, all of the U.S.-based national networks of people living with HIV (PLHIV) unanimously endorsed and pledged to support HIV 2020: Community Reclaiming the Global Response, which will take place in Mexico City July 6-8, 2020.
We are appreciative that the HIV 2020 Alliance has quickly organized to host HIV 2020: Community Reclaiming the Global Response as a community-led event to provide a safe and meaningful alternative for individuals who cannot or will not attend AIDS 2020, an international conference currently planned for the same week in the U.S., due to discriminatory U.S. immigration and travel policies. AIDS 2020 is being organized in San Francisco by the International AIDS Society and partners, despite opposition from a wide range of global and local stakeholders.
Organizers of the community-led event cite serious concerns about hostile U.S. immigration policies designed primarily to exclude Black, brown and low-income people (especially those from Muslim, African, Caribbean and Latin American countries), as well as people who use drugs, sex workers, and people of trans experience.
“As a national network of transgender people living with HIV, we are constantly under attack by the current administration. We know that we cannot treat ourselves out of the HIV epidemic,” says Evonne Kaho, a member of Positively Trans from Mississippi. “We need to address the social and political structures that reinforce inequity and create vulnerability in the first place.”
In addition to every single one of the U.S.-based national PLHIV networks, initial endorsers and organizers of the alternative HIV 2020 gathering include an impressive and diverse range of stakeholders representing key populations, including Global Network of Sex Work Projects, Harm Reduction Coalition, Innovative Response Globally to Transgender Women and HIV, International Civil Society Support, International Community of Women Living with HIV, International HIV/AIDS Alliance, the International Network of People Who Use Drugs (INPUD), International Treatment Preparedness Coalition, MPact Global Action for Gay Men’s Health and Rights, Sisterlove, Inc., and the Transgender Law Center. The list continues to grow.
Organizers of HIV 2020 are working with the Mexican government to ensure access for key populations who are not able to safely attend the IAS conference in the U.S. According to the HIV 2020 alliance, the Mexico City conference will be “a community-centered, key population-led, interdisciplinary, intersectional, and sex positive event.” The focus will be on community-driven solutions, sharing ideas and needs across key populations globally, and assert the rights of key populations in the HIV epidemic and in the rest of our lives.
As U.S.-based networks of people living with HIV, issues facing communities most impacted by the domestic epidemic are of critical importance to us. According to Malcolm Reid, Policy Director at Atlanta-based ThriveSS, “We are a nonprofit organization representing Black men and women living with HIV. We understand that some of our members and supporters may believe that hosting AIDS 2020 in the US would be a benefit to them; however, we stand in solidarity with HIV 2020 because we are here to advocate for all people living with HIV. We also realize that the cost of attending a San Francisco-based conference will be prohibitive for most Black people living with HIV in the U.S.”
“We look forward to supporting HIV 2020 and call on donors, funders and researchers to step up and resource this community-driven conference at the same level they might commit to a Bay Area-based event,” said Andrew Spieldenner, Chair of the U.S. People Living with HIV Caucus.
For more information and to support HIV 2020, visit HIV2020.org.
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