Pubdate: Fri, 3 Dec 2010 Source: Strand, The (CN ON Edu) Copyright: 2010 The Strand Contact: http://www.thestrand.ca/home/lettertotheeditor/ Website: http://www.thestrand.ca Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3546 Author: Deanna Henderson Cited: Vienna Declaration: http://www.viennadeclaration.com/ O...CANADA Canada Flounders As Global Leader at 18th International AIDS Conference When HIV/AIDS first crept onto medical radar in the early 1980s, it was a mystery. Doctors from the U.S., France, Zaire, and Haiti noticed that patients, their immune systems overwhelmed, were dying from infections an otherwise healthy body would be able to fight off. By 1983, French medical researchers had isolated the virus HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), which attacks the immune system and leaves the body vulnerable to infections and cancers. HIV was later connected to the development of AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome - when the body is no longer able to protect itself from infection.) The AIDS pandemic has been shadowed by a fear epidemic, stemming from when little was known about the disease beyond that it was perceived as a "death sentence," and propelled over time by stigmas. These prejudice range from the popular, albeit misconceived, term for the AIDS pandemic in the 1980s as the "gay plague" to Rob Ford's usual hidebound remarks. 1 Dec. was World AIDS Day, founded in the late 1980s, which strives to raise awareness and dispel stigmas about HIV/AIDS. The World AIDS Day campaign doesn't only encourage awareness through collective action, it also challenges world leaders to commit to, and realize the connection between, universal access to health care and human rights. At this year's 18th annual International AIDS Conference (held in Vienna from 18 - 23 July) the Canadian government demonstrated its abiding unwillingness to make global commitments (one example among many was when the Harper government refused to fund birth control for any foreign aid projects concerned with maternal health). The federal government refused to sign the Vienna Declaration, an official International AIDS Conference document, published by The Lancet medical journal, which proposes to improve health and safety by using scientific evidence as a basis for national policies bout drug use. The declaration has been endorsed by people like Stephen Lewis, a former UN envoy on AIDS in Africa and founder of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, and by some of the world's leading HIV and drug scientific organizations like International AIDS Society. However, the Canadian government repudiated the document because it is not consistent with Canada's drug policy. While there are needle exchange and outreach programs instituted on the provincial level, the federal government's drug policy falls on prohibition and rehabilitation. This "War on Drugs," a socially conservative - some would say reactionary - policy, eschews one of the greater social concerns outlined in Vienna Declaration, that the "HIV epidemics fuelled by the criminalization of people who use illicit drugs and by prohibitions on the provision of sterile needles and opioid substitution treatment." Refusing to endorse the Vienna Declaration is not the federal government's first step backwards concerning the HIV/AIDS pandemic. This summer, the Harper government and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation cancelled plans to build a multi-million dollar HIV/AIDS vaccine facility in Canada. Only obtuse explanations were offered about research proposals being inadequate, that studies showed global networks were "sufficient," and that there was a "renewed" funding plan (which has been criticized for being vague on how funding for HIV/AIDS research will be distributed and prioritized). The World AIDS Day initiative wants people to "Act Aware," maybe the Canadian government will give more than a second thought as to why Canada's booth at the International AIDS Conference was vandalised by HIV/AIDS activists. The Canadian government should heed the words of Canadians, like Stephen Lewis, who have characterized the Canadian government's resolve as inadequate. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake