Views

Annie Howard, HIV Confident Programme Manager, shares how HIV Confident is helping organisations turn awareness into action for Zero HIV Stigma Day.

James Cole, Senior Policy, Research and Influencing Manager, shares why the UN Political Declaration on HIV must reinforce UK action at home and abroad.

Reflections on the proposed social media ban and the role of social media for young people living with HIV.

In 2015, an HIV outbreak was detected amongst people who inject drugs (PWIDs) in Glasgow. Three years on the outbreak has still not been controlled, and over 100 PWIDs in Scotland have been diagnosed with HIV. Those diagnosed have complex needs and experience severe social exclusion, with 40% having a history of incarceration and 45% reported ever being homeless.

Do we have PrEP in England? Well, yes and no. We have the PrEP Impact trial which currently has 10,000 places available for PrEP in sexual health clinics across the country. The study is being paid for by NHS England, which is a great step forward from where we were two years ago. Back then, the NHS were insisting that they didn’t have the powers to pay for PrEP. NAT had to take the NHS to court to convince them otherwise.

This week, a vitally important report has been published – entitled ‘Women and HIV: Invisible No Longer’, the report is the culmination of a one year research project conducted by Sophia Forum and Terrence Higgins Trust into the needs of women affected by HIV.

World Health Day, organised by the World Health Organisation, is a global awareness day celebrated on 7th April each year to draw attention to a subject of importance to global health. This year the theme is universal health coverage.

International Women’s Day (8 March 2018) is a time to celebrate the achievements of women, but it’s also an opportunity to highlight what more needs to be done in the struggle for equality. And this year’s official theme, #PressforProgress, reflects this. Women living with or at risk of HIV in the UK continue to be impacted by complex and nuanced issues that relate to gender and other inequalities. We’d love for women to get in touch on twitter @NAT_AIDS Trust or at [email protected] to let us know what you think are the major issues affecting women living with HIV today, and how NAT might help.

Confidentiality of patient information is one of the most ancient and important principles of medicine. If doctors tell other people what we tell them, many of us would avoid healthcare and as a result get sick, and possibly die. Infectious diseases would spread in the population unchecked. That’s why there are well established rules in law and medical ethics both to require confidentiality and also lay down the rare circumstances where confidentiality might be breached.

A new Private Member’s Bill is attracting widespread attention and support, including a moving feature on BBC’s The One Show this week (29 January 2018). The Bill admirably aims to increase protection for emergency workers who suffer assaults at work, with a focus on tougher sentencing laws.[1] But one part of the Bill is alarming to us at NAT, and other public health experts. This part will make it an offence, punishable by fine, for suspects to refuse to be tested for infectious diseases following spitting and biting incidents.

One year before she died, in the summer of 1996, Diana, Princess of Wales, resigned from almost 100 charities of which she had been patron or president. Instead she chose to concentrate on just six which she felt most passionately about. One of them was the National Aids Trust, which this year celebrates its 30th anniversary.