Communities urged to lead fight against HIV/AIDS

Significant gains have been made in the fight against the human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS), but there is still a lot of unfinished business in the drive to end it as a public health threat by 2030.

This was one of the main takeaways from Friday’s annual World AIDS Day Forum, held at The Summit, 16 Chelsea Avenue, New Kingston.

Commemorated globally each year on December 1, this year’s theme was ‘Let Communities Lead’, while the theme for the forum was ‘Reimaging and Transforming the HIV response through the Lenses of Communities’, which was declared to be a call to action, emphasising the role communities play in the HIV/AIDS response.

Multi-Country Director of Caribbean UNAIDS, Dr Richard Amenyah, underscored the need for timely, reliable information. He disclosed that up to 40 per cent of people who are newly initiated on HIV/AIDS treatment are coming into their clinics late, with stigma still a major deterrent to them coming forward.

“How do we remove stigma as a barrier? How do we encourage people to show up in our clinics? No one should die of AIDS in this day and age, and it is important that we work with communities – address issues around human rights; address issues around stigma and discrimination; address issues around gender-based violence – this is what it takes to get there. No one does it better than communities,” he declared.

“Communities should be seen by partners as complementing the work of national governments, and so, for the United Nations, we call on governments to renew their social contracts with communities. Let’s strengthen the institutional capacities of communities and ensure that communities are part and parcel of the planning and execution of programming. Communities need the resources to be able to provide the necessary support that government needs to end the AIDS epidemic,” he continued.

Meanwhile, Executive Director of the Jamaican Network for Seropositives, Jumoke Patrick, underscored that enabling communities to take the lead is a catalyst for broader global change.

“Let communities lead and watch Jamaica transform,” he urged. “It encourages the community members to actively participate in decision-making processes, advocating for their rights and challenges, and challenge stigma and discrimination associated with HIV.”

Jamaica, Patrick said, “has a crucial role in fostering a harmonious environment through stronger political commitment ... where all communities can live, raise families and do business, regardless of their HIV status, sexual orientation, gender or age”.

Executive Director of the Caribbean Vulnerable Communities Coalition, Ivan Cruickshank, wants decision-makers and policymakers to recognise the pivotal role that communities can have in transforming the impact of HIV on the local health landscape.

“It is not just asking people to lead; it is giving them the space and the opportunity to do that leadership,” Cruickshank reasoned. “The evidence is quite clear, where communities are weak; where communities do not have the adequate resources to support them; where they are not given the type of infrastructure to drive community transformation, societies collapse. So this is not about HIV alone, this is about communities being integral to social responses.”

United Nations Resident Co-ordinator to Jamaica and The Bahamas, Dennis Zulu, pointed out that, globally, AIDS-related deaths have fallen by almost 70 per cent since the peak in 2004, while new HIV infections are at their lowest point since the 1980s.

“But AIDS-related complications still take a life every minute. We can, and must, end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030. The path to ending AIDS runs through communities – from connecting people to treatment, services and support, they need to go to the grass-roots activism pushing for action, so all people can realise their rights to health.”

christopher.serju@gleanerjm.com