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ICAD Blog

Year: <span>2018</span>

How Keyhole Gardens Are Helping the Battle Against HIV/AIDS
December 19, 2018

By Help Lesotho

Grandmothers are the key support structure for children in Lesotho and are essential to their survival. Many of them have lost their own children and family members to HIV/AIDS, leaving them confused, lonely and grief-stricken.

Despite their own poverty, illnesses and hopelessness, grandmothers have opened their homes and hearts to Lesotho’s orphaned children, filling the role of parents and guardians. They have the burden and the unique opportunity to support their grandchildren to become educated young leaders.

One such grandmother (‘nkhono’), Nkhono ‘Mafese’s life has been a series of tragedies. She became a widower after 20 years of marriage when her husband contracted Tuberculosis from working in … Read more →

 

Canada’s hidden HIV epidemic
December 7, 2018

By Laurie Edmiston, CATIE Earlier this year, I witnessed a profound historic moment at the International AIDS Conference in Amsterdam. Dr. Alison Rodger, a leading HIV researcher in the United Kingdom, presented the final results from a study of couples with one HIV-positive and one HIV-negative partner. After eight years of the study, she reported, there were zero cases of HIV transmission from one partner to the other – thanks to the prevention benefits of modern HIV medications. The evidence has been mounting for years. Several large clinical trials have confirmed that HIV treatment can suppress the virus so successfully that sexual transmission doesn’t occur. Three-quarters of Canadians diagnosed with … Read more →

 

Closing the Gap? Cut the Crap!
December 4, 2018

New Research Priorities from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) Restricts Prevention Options By Marc-André LeBlanc, Founding member of IRMA

International Rectal Microbicide Advocates (IRMA) and our many partners and allies believe we need an array of HIV prevention options. There has been enormous progress in the field of HIV prevention research in recent years. The remarkably high efficacy of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) for prevention has been demonstrated, both for oral pre-exposure prophylaxis ( PrEP, now approved and subsidized in several countries ) and through treatment leading to viral suppression or “undetectability” ( U=U, Undetectable = Untransmittable ).

Microbicide—products that could be used vaginally or rectally to reduce a … Read more →

 

Bridging the Gap Between Community and Researchers
December 4, 2018

By Jes Hovanes, Communications and Social Media Officer, CIHR Canadian HIV Trials Network There is a line in Tony Kushner’s 1991 play Angels in America where, in the early days of the HIV epidemic, the character Belize, a nurse working in the AIDS ward in New York, warns Roy Cohn, who is dying of AIDS, to “watch out for the double-blind. They’ll want you to sign something that says they can give you M&M’s instead of the real drug. You’ll die, but they’ll get the kind of statistics they can publish in The New England Journal of Medicine…” Thankfully, this portrayed gap between the interests of medical researchers and the … Read more →

 

A Message From a U=U Warrior: “Rest in Peace HIV-related Stigma, you will NOT be missed”
December 1, 2018

By Jeff Potts (with permission) To suggest, on this 30th World AIDS Day (and for me personally, the 28th), that I am not profoundly overwhelmed or just a little bit exhausted would be disingenuous to be sure. I stood alongside and with some of the most-amazing, history-making people today, at the foot of Centre Block where I witnessed and was part of the most incredible moments this country’s HIV community has ever experienced. I was truly wiped when I got home… it was the most exhilarating kind of tired I’ve felt in a very long time. Today, the AIDS Committee of Ottawa kept its promise to leave an indelible mark … Read more →

 

Why World AIDS Day Means More than Words on a Calendar
November 30, 2018

By Robin Montgomery, Executive Director, ICAD Today is December 1 – a day when communities around the world commemorate World AIDS Day with efforts that celebrate our successes and pause to remember the millions who we have lost the fight against HIV. World AIDS Day also offers us opportunity to reflect, to re-calibrate, and to mobilize with increased force towards our collective Global Goal to end HIV as a public health threat by 2030. …sirens are blaring with warning that the world is off-track… like, way off track. This year’s World AIDS Day is unlike those that have come before. Today recognizes the 30th anniversary of World AIDS Day. Yes, … Read more →

 

CHABAC Hubs to host Community Roundtables to coincide with World AIDS Day
November 28, 2018

28 November 2018 – The Canadian HIV/AIDS Black, African and Caribbean (CHABAC) Network is hosting community roundtables in Ottawa, Edmonton, Toronto, Calgary and Halifax beginning December 1, 2018 to consult with service providers working with African, Black and Caribbean communities on the development of an African, Caribbean and Black-specific program science model. The initiative, is part of a five-year project (2018-2023) carried out in partnership by the Interagency Coalition on AIDS and Development, AIDS Committee of Ottawa, Health Association of African Canadians, HIV Community Link, HIV Edmonton and the African Black Diaspora Global Network.

Data shows that African, Caribbean and Black people, whether born in Canada or in so called … Read more →

 

Parliamentary Breakfast Commemorating World AIDS Day 2018 and Aboriginal AIDS Awareness Week
November 14, 2018

Join us in Ottawa for a Parliamentary Breakfast commemorating World AIDS Day 2018 and Aboriginal AIDS Awareness Week  

This event will feature international and Indigenous community leaders discussing Closing the Gap in access to HIV and health services among adolescent girls and young women, within the context of this year’s AAAW and World AIDS Campaign theme of “Know your Status”.

What: Parliamentary breakfast in honour of World AIDS Day and Aboriginal AIDS Awareness Week
When: Thursday November 29th, 7:30 am to 9:30 am
Where:   180 Wellington St., Room 325, Ottawa

Please RSVP to Shayna Buhler by November 26th at 5pm EST at sbuhler@icad-cisd.com or (613) 233-7440 ext. 114  

This event … Read more →

 

Canada-wide Coalition Calls for End to the Toxic Drug Supply and Decriminalization of Possession of Currently Illegal Drugs
October 3, 2018

ICAD signs on to call to action. Stimulus Conference - October 3, 2018. We, a coalition of Canadian organizations with legal, human rights, harm reduction and lived experience representation, call on our provincial and federal governments to accelerate their response […]

 

Joint Statement on Behalf of Affected Communities and Civil Society on the Occasion of the First United Nations High-Level Meeting on the Fight to End Tuberculosis
September 26, 2018

ICAD signs on to Statement: We, the undersigned members of communities affected by tuberculosis (TB), civil society organizations and networks, and individuals, recognize and appreciate this momentous occasion of the first United Nations High-Level Meeting on the Fight to End […]

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