16th International AIDS Conference
Experience Sharing on
The 16th International AIDS Conference
by
Kwong Suk-chun, Victoria, Senior Nursing Officer,
Special Preventive Programme
The 16th International AIDS Conference was held during 13 - 18 August, 2006 at the Metropolitan Toronto Conference Center in the downtown of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The theme of the Conference was ¡§Time to Deliver¡¨, translated literally as "time to act", reminding us that we must take prompt preventive and control measures, and respond timely to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS.
The Conference was the world¡¦s largest meeting on HIV/AIDS with 25,000 ¡V 30,000 representatives coming from 160 countries. The Conference covered a wide range of programmes, they included satellite conferences, the main Conference plus seminars, poster exhibitions and other subsidiary activities. The organizer even established a Global Village for participating representatives to set up their own booth to organize cultural programmes and forum. The venue was huge and many of the programmes were launched at the same period of time, so I was unable to participate in all the programmes or missed part of them. Thanks to the advancement in technology, those who want to learn about the event can always browse through the web pages for information about the Conference, but the only thing is a lack of exchanges at the spot.
As a representative of Hong Kong, I took part in two skills building workshops and posters presentation. A nurse specialist from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and I hosted two identical skills building workshops "Case Management in HIV Nursing" conducted in English and Putonghua respectively. Officials from the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Africa, India, South East Asia, Mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong as well as participants from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) took active part in the discussions. They shared their experiences and learnt a lot from each other. We got positive feedbacks and encouragements from them also. Another skills building workshop was hosted by Dr Chen, Chairman of the Advisory Council on AIDS on ¡§What do People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) really need? Scale up HIV/AIDS Management and Rehabilitation¡¨. It was through these exchanges that we realized the services we provided in Hong Kong were up to the standard of the United State of America (US) and other European countries.
The organizing country invited Bill Clinton, the former US President and Bill Gates, Chairman of the Microsoft Corporation to attend the Conference. The full support they took towards AIDS was encouraging. Richard Gere, movie star from the Hollywood also made an effort to raise the awareness of the Indian community towards HIV/AIDS and encourage the people to be accommodating towards those living with HIV/AIDS. Moreover, the Global Fund and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation increased their allocations for research on AIDS prevention. These demonstrated that the participation of the Government and huge corporations could serve as a jump-start for the preventive work. Nevertheless, if we look at the issue from a different perspective, we wonder whether these financial resources are adequate for solving the problems of AIDS spread in developing countries and drugs patent. As a matter of fact, AIDS as a topic for international discussion is no longer just a simple matter of life and death. In order to find a solution for it, experts from all over the world are trying hard to explore this disease which borne with it political, economic, social and sexual characteristics.
The Conference had enriched my knowledge and enabled me to better understand the HIV/AIDS situation globally and also the challenges that the preventive work had to face. Reviewing the situation in Hong Kong, the Special Preventive Programme of the Department of Health is dedicated towards AIDS prevention and health promotion and the provision of clinical services for those living with HIV. The concerted efforts made over the years by the Government, people from different sectors and the NGOs in combating AIDS had contributed to the low HIV prevalence rates. However, we must not be self-complacent with the present situation. In order to wipe it out from the world, we still need to work hard on health promotion campaigns and researches on preventive work.
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