The 5th Annual International Conference on Stigma (2014)

Lean on Me: Standing Together for Human Rights in Health

Hundreds of health-care providers, public health officials, activists, students, faith leaders, people affected by HIV and experts from across the globe will gather this week for the 5th Annual International Conference on Stigma, “Lean on Me! Standing Together for Human Rights in Health”.

The daylong conference will seek strategies to eliminate the stigma associated with HIV that keeps those affected from seeking proper care and treatment and protecting others. The event will take place at the Howard University College of Medicine in Washington, DC on Friday November 21, 2014, from 8 AM to 5 PM.

Through speeches, panel discussions, poetry and music the International Conference on Stigma will explore the root causes, social and individual impacts and means to overcome a powerful, often deadly force that ruins lives and destroys human dignity.

Topics will include the evolution of human rights in the global HIV/AIDS response, the stigma of addiction and infectious diseases, HIV/AIDS struggles in the context of reproductive justice, and the lessons learned from recent, dramatic developments in Uganda.

CHLP Executive director Catherine Hanssens will join Dr. Jeffrey Birnbaum, Executive Director of the HEAT Program at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, NY, and International Social Media Activist Maria Mejia in a breakout session on Ethics of HIV Disclosure: To Tell or Not to Tell? moderated by Lisa Bediako of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, Inc.

The impressive list of panelists and speakers includes community activists, government representatives, authors, artists and scientific experts from around the world. Among them:

Douglas Brooks, Director, White House Office of National AIDS Policy

Noerine Kaleeba, Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)

Jamie Gentille, Author of “Surviving HIV: Growing Up a Secret and Being Positive”

Pauline Muchina, Founder, Future African Leaders Project/African Women &Youth Initiative

The conference, sponsored by the Howard University based Coalition for Elimination of AIDS-Related Stigma (CEAS), drew a diverse audience of more than 750 attendees in 2013.

Where: Howard University College of Medicine, 520 W St, NW, Washington, DC 20059

When: Friday November 21, 2014, from 8 AM to 5 PM

For more information: http://www.whocanyoutell.org