World AIDS Day 2011

[Fire Daughter]

Hi everyone

I know I haven't been around that much lately. Life is pretty crazy right now. But, I thought I'd stop by, say "HI" and start the annual WAD thread that Mom began back when she first joined the Watch. Even though she is no longer here with us physically, her and Uncle Steve's fight against HIV/AIDS lives on.

WAD is 12/1/2011 and this year we have a new global envoy to help spread awareness and help with prevention, Ellen Degeneres

news.yahoo.com/actress-named-aids-envoy-us-pledges-funding-165403555.html

Here is a link to Avert's WAD page:

www.avert.org/world-aids-day.htm

Lots of info on this page about HIV/AIDS, stats, projects, and research news.

On a side note: My Dad, brothers and sisters, Myles and I are getting involved in Cancer prevention, research and patient advocacy programs in Mom's name.

Huggles all!

[aliantha]

Thanks, FD! You guys are awesome.

[sgt.null]

thank you - prayers to all affected at any point...

[Fire Daughter]

I thought this might be of interest. Magic Johnson was diagnosed in 1991...

www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/health ... not-cured/

It was AIDS activist Elizabeth Glaser who convinced Johnson to go public with his diagnosis. Glaser had contracted HIV during a blood transfusion while she was giving birth to daughter Ariel, and she had passed the virus on to Ariel and her son Jake. “She made me promise before she died that I would become the face of the disease and really go out and help people and educate people about it,” Johnson recalls. Most crucially, Glaser was able to convince Cookie, who was two months pregnant at the time, that “the world should know that Magic Johnson had HIV.”

[Fire Daughter]

*Heavy heavy sigh*

I thought we were at least beyond this when it comes to fighting HIV infection.

news.yahoo.com/claim-hershey-school-rejects-hiv-positive-pa-boy-231440528.html

Claim: Hershey school rejects HIV-positive Pa. boy
By PETER JACKSON | AP – 15 hrs ago
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HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A private boarding school connected with the Hershey chocolate company says it was trying to protect other students when it denied admission to a Philadelphia-area teenager because he is HIV-positive.
The AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania filed a lawsuit on behalf of the unidentified boy in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia on Wednesday, claiming the Milton Hershey School for disadvantaged students violated the Americans with Disabilities Act.
School officials acknowledged that the 13-year-old boy was denied admission because of his medical condition. They said they believed it was necessary to protect the health and safety of the 1,850 others enrolled in the residential institution, which serves children in pre-kindergarten to 12th grade and where students live in homes with 10 to 12 others.
"In order to protect our children in this unique environment, we cannot accommodate the needs of students with chronic communicable diseases that pose a direct threat to the health and safety of others," the school said in a statement Wednesday.
Such restrictions are not limited to HIV, school spokeswoman Connie McNamara said Thursday.
Attorney Ronda Goldfein says her client requires no special accommodations. He is an honor-roll student and athlete who controls his HIV with medication that does not affect his school schedule, she said.
"This young man is a motivated, intelligent kid who poses no health risk to other students but is being denied an educational opportunity because of ignorance and fear about HIV and AIDS," Goldfein said.
School officials said they were preparing seek a declaratory judgment from the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania on legal issues surrounding the case when the AIDS Law Project "took the adversarial action of filing a lawsuit."
Goldfein said Thursday she was not aware that the school was contemplating such a court filing, but said action is needed because one-third of the school year is already over.
"The sooner we can get this matter resolved and get my student into an appropriate academic setting, the better," she said.
Congress amended the Americans with Disabilities Act in 2008 to reaffirm that HIV is a qualified disability entitled to accommodation by public and private schools, a lawyer at the New York City-based Center for HIV Law and Policy said.
Beirne Roose-Snyder, the group's managing attorney, said discrimination against people with HIV remains "rampant," even though the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said for years that the virus is not transmitted through casual contact. Fewer cases are going to trial, she said.
The school's statement "shows a real lack of understanding of the real threat of HIV," Roose-Snyder said.
Goldfein said the HIV discrimination cases she has seen in recent years usually boil down to one person's word against another.
"The reality is, people don't usually admit it like this," she said Thursday.
Founded in 1909 by chocolate maker Milton Hershey, the school educates low-income and socially disadvantaged students for free. It is financed by the Milton Hershey School Trust, which also holds the controlling interest in The Hershey Co.

Let's just throw back to the early 80's...good grief!

[aliantha]

It takes awhile for news to get to the hinterlands.... I hope that judge hands the school its butt on a plate.

[MsMary]

Unfortunately, there's still a lot of ignorance out there.

[Avatar]

And clearly not just in Africa either.

Uh...happy world aids day? That doesn't sound right somehow...

--A

[deer of the dawn]

To anyone on the Watch who is positive, or loves someone who is; or who is doing their part to fight the spread and mitigate the consequences: Blessings, courage, strength!

This month, all royalties from sales of my book Blackbirch Woods are going to support AIDS orphans in Nigeria through Mashiah Foundation.

[Fire Daughter]

That's awesome, Deer!! The Mashiah Foundation does great work.

And Av, we all pray that this past World AIDS Day was the last one...

[Avatar]

Y'know, it's not impossible. Not in one year, but really, in theory it's possible to wipe out AIDS in a generation or two. Or at least make it so rare as to be remarkable.

Two ways...educate everybody so well that there are no more transmissions, or quarantine everybody who has it for life. We could use Australia.

--A

[aliantha]

No, we can't. It doesn't exist, remember?