Nobody can have missed the fact that a new type of vaccine has had tremendous success against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
To understand the breadth and complexity of aging with HIV, one really needs to experience it. Much of the dialogue, though, is driven by those who haven’t. That is particularly apparent with respect to issues affecting our elders. And that is why my interest is not so much in HIV and aging as in HIV and the aged. In other words, the destination is as important as the journey.
The Manitoba HIV/STBBI Collective Impact Network is an initiative to eliminate sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections (STBBIs) as a public health threat through collective and collaborative action. The network is hosted by Nine Circles Community Health Centre in Winnipeg. Mike Payne and Laurie Ringaert, the strategic facilitators for the Network, answered a few questions from CATIE about how the Network is addressing STBBIs in the province.
Earlier this month, we received the sad news of the passing of Timothy Ray Brown. Also known as “the Berlin patient”, Timothy was the first person in the world to be cured of HIV. While he remained HIV-negative until his death, the leukemia that he had successfully fought before returned in 2019. It was this leukemia diagnosis that prompted the historic treatment that cured Timothy of HIV. When scheduled to undergo a stem cell transplant as cancer treatment, doctors matched him with a donor who had an uncommon genetic mutation known to confer resistance to HIV. Although he suffered complications...
Thirty years ago, a group of scientists gathered around a kitchen table on Davie Street, in the heart of Vancouver’s West End, to discuss ways to provide better care for and prolong the lives of people living with HIV who, at the time, were dying by the hundreds and extremely stigmatized. In Canada, there was not yet a network for physicians to come together and conduct HIV clinical trials. And so, the CIHR Canadian HIV Trials Network (CTN) was born, providing a platform for Canadian researchers to generate good scientific evidence.
On June 14, I travelled to Toronto to meet with leading activists, researchers and experts working to end the criminalization of HIV in Canada for the 8th Symposium on HIV, Law and Human Rights. Organized by the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, the annual forum for the past few years has focused solely on advocacy to end Canada’s position as a global leader in the criminalization of people living with HIV for alleged non-disclosure, exposure and transmission.
