August 29, 2018: PWN-USA members and staff will be at USCA in beautiful Orlando, Florida, representing U.S. women living with HIV. We hope you will join us for some of these discussions and presentations.

Whether you are at USCA or at home, you can follow us on Twitter to get in on the conversation by using the hashtags #pwnspeaks #2018USCA. Here is where you will find us at USCA!

Daily 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM Positively Aware Booth 206 in the Exhibit Hall Waheedah Shabazz-El will distribute outreach information on behalf of PWN-USA.

Thursday, September 6

Opening Plenary: Activism and the Intersection of Movements Fighting for Social Justice

11:30 AM – 1:30 PM Plenary Ballroom Join us as we hear from social justice movement leaders and advocates for racial health equity. The speakers will share their thoughts on the need for activism in our communities to ultimately affect positive change. The themes of racism, gun violence, health access and equity are intersecting our lives more prominently day-by-day. Together, let’s determine a way forward. Presenters: Alicia Garza, Co-Founder of #BlackLivesMatter; David Hogg, Activist and Survivor of Marjory Stoneman Douglas School Shooting, Parkland, FL; Naina Khanna, Executive Director, Positive Women’s Network – USA; Abigail Echo-Hawk, Director, Urban Indian Health Institute, Seattle, WA; Richard L. Zaldivar, Executive Director, The Wall-Las Memorias, Los Angeles, CA and Larry Walker, Executive Director, THRIVE SS, Inc., Atlanta, Georgia.

Forging a Successful Path to HIV Criminalization Reform in California!

2:00 PM – 4:00 PM Celebration 11 Using California’s recent success modernizing HIV criminal laws as a case study, this workshop will explore effective messaging, strategy and coalition development to counter opposition and to build support to pass comprehensive HIV criminalization reform. The workshop will examine the political, institutional, and public opposition to Senate Bill 239 in California; describe formation of the coalition and identification of bill authors; outline effective messages; discuss selection of appropriate messengers and lobbying strategies; and explain how negative media attention shaped the coalition’s communications strategy. Workshop participants will learn how to survey their own states’ potential for modernizing HIV criminal laws and be empowered to develop strategies to meet their own unique challenges, including the importance and challenges to centering of people living with HIV in the processes. Presenters are Craig Pulsipher, APLA Health, Los Angeles, California; Naina Khanna, Positive Women’s Network- USA, Oakland, California and Scott Schoettes, Lambda Legal, Chicago, Illinois.

Sister to Sister: Women of Color Long Term – Survivors Building Our Voices of Resilience

2:00 PM – 4:00 PM Manatee Spring 1, Lobby Level Grantees will present about their projects logistics and implementation as well as lessons learned from the mini-grant program. This program awarded twelve mini-grants this year. The main purpose of the mini-grant is to help scholars develop ideas for working with the community of people living with and aging with HIV in their towns and cities. The scholars also learned basic skills on how to apply for a grant, work on project reports, look for resources, develop community events and mobilize their peers. The Mini-Grant Project gives grantees the opportunity to present about their projects at USCA. Presenter: Teresa Sullivan, PWN Board Co-Chair.  

HIV Communication: Reducing Stigma through Language

4:00 PM – 6:00 PM Celebration 5 Researches, clinicians and other stakeholders unintentionally use terminology in verbal and written form that further stigmatizes people living with HIV (PLHIV). Although stigmatizing language surrounding HIV has been used for decades, a growing number of individuals in the community of PLHIV have expressed concerns over the unintentional stigma conveyed by certain terminology. The aim of this interactive workshop is to explore the history of terminology used to describe HIV, detail how the use of stigmatizing language affects both internal (how we feel about themselves) and external stigma (how others relate to us) and highlight the history and understanding of people first language. This interactive sessions includes small group exercises and attendee feedback on the use of language. Presenter: Vickie Lynn; Venita Ray, Positive Women’s Network – USA, Houston, Texas. 

Friday, September 7

Long Term Survivor Joint Reception

4:00 PM – 7:15 PM Manatee Spring 1, Lobby Level The Reunion Project’s goal is to bring long-term survivors (LTS) living with HIV together with their enduring allies who are witnesses to and acting to confront the HIV epidemic. Renowned HIV treatment activists and LTS implemented The Reunion Project with a town hall model, to reunite diverse survivor communities in jurisdictions nationally where mobilization had not yet begun. Most recently, in March 2018, a community-led, diverse coalition of survivor-advocates took a deeper dive into the survivor psychosocial and community landscape during The Reunion Project’s national roundtable forum. As people living with HIV and AIDS, our survival has been an act of resistance and resilience, This session will revisit the national roundtable forum by identifying, revealing, sharing and embracing the techniques and nuances we attribute to being long-term survivors of the HIV and AIDS epidemic – both before and since the development of highly-active antiretroviral therapy. Panelists: Waheedah Shabazz-El, Positive Women’s Network – USA & The Reunion Project; Moises Alvarez, Jeff Berry and Gregg Cassins.

Saturday, September 8

Let’s Fight Back: The Affordable Care Act is Under Attack

9:00 AM – 11:00 AM Room: Celebration 3 & 4 This workshop will provide an overview of recent efforts by the Trump Administration and Congress to undermine the Affordable Care Act and other important health reforms. It will describe how these efforts threaten access to high-quality and affordable health care for people living with HIV.  Join us for a discussion about new Trump proposals that include work requirements, drug screening and restricting prescription drug access. Learn more about efforts to challenge this Administration and Congress and how to participate in grassroots advocacy to protect and promote the health, rights and dignity of people living with HIV! Presenters are Jaron Benjamin, Housing Works, New York, New York; Ramon Gardenhire, AIDS Foundation Chicago, Chicago, Illinois; Robert Greenwald, Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation of Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Massachusetts; Naina Khanna, Positive Women’s Network – USA, Oakland, California.

Plenary Luncheon: Trauma-Informed Care: Aging with HIV and the Trauma of Surviving

11:00 AM – 1:30 PM Plenary Ballroom The goal of this plenary is to make the case for trauma informed care for those living with HIV and, trauma informed prevention for the populations at high risk of infection. We will reach our goal by focusing on HIV long-term survivors over 50 years old who are facing aging having gone through heavy grief, isolation and post-traumatic stress disorder. There are many types of trauma associated to people of color that need to be identified and dealt with if we are to be successful in HIV care and biomedical prevention among communities of color. Speakers: Eric Dube, ViiV Healthcare; Dr. Michele Andrasik, HVTN Core; Ron Stall, Director of the Center for LGBT Health Research; Barbara Poma, Owner, Pulse and L’Orengelis Thomas Negron.

PWN-USA Listening Session

6:30 PM – 7:30 PM Silver Spring Room, Convention Level This session will be for WLHIV only. We will invite WLHIV to discuss their experiences and feelings about specific topics like criminalization, family planning, immigration, health care, access to PrEp:   What advocacy can look like around these things in their communities and how PWN-USA can be of assistance. Session goals are: 1. To gather thoughts and opinions from various communities around advocacy issues; 2.  Assist MEC in understanding advocacy needs or desires of the membership and 3. Understand how WLHIV are thinking about their connection to these issues. Moderator is Evany Turk, Membership Engagement Coordinator, Positive Women’s Network – USA.

Sunday, September 9

The Third U is Universal Access: Achieving Racial and Gender Justice in U=U

9:00 AM – 11:00 AM People of color, especially Black and Latinx folks, are disproportionately impacted by the US HIV epidemic. U=U holds great promise for advance rights and dignity for people living with HIV. But structural barriers, especially racism and other forms of stigma and discrimination, have presented tremendous obstacles to ensuring that everyone living with HIV has equitable access to quality healthcare and treatment. In this workshop, we will discuss why it’s imperative to develop greater focus on racial and gender justice in U=U discourse and present strategies that are working to engage communities of color. Presenters will facilitate a solution-oriented dialogue with participants. Presenters are Naina Khanna, Positive Women’s Network – USA, Oakland, California; Daniel Driffin, THRIVE SS, Inc., Atlanta, Georgia.

Inter-Generational Sisterhood and Storytelling Among Black Women Living with HIV

9:00 AM – 11:00 AM Rainbow Spring Black women are the most impacted by the HIV epidemic and account for 60% of all women living with HIV due to factors like racism, discrimination and gender inequality. Because HIV impacts Black women of all ages, there is a need for sisterhood and solidarity in our personal journeys and in the HIV movement that is inclusive of all ages. This workshop will feature a series of revealing conversations about the lived experiences of Black women living with HIV that will include young women who acquired HIV from birth, later acquisition and long-term survivors. Please join us for rich storytelling from the unique perspectives across the spectrum of intergenerational leadership and sisterhood. Panelists will share about the unspoken generational divide in the HIV movement, ways to meaningfully bridge that divide and ideas about how to engage with generations behind us until there’s a cure. Presenter: Gina Marie Brown. Moderator: Venita Ray, Positive Women’s Network – USA, Dallas, Texas.