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"We need laws and policies that enable and encourage people to accessprevention and treatment services, not policies that criminalize people, drivethem underground, or block HIV-positive people from entering the country,"said Peter Piot, Executive Director of UNAIDS. "We need more concrete programsto empower marginalized people to claim their rights. Only then will weovercome the forces of inequality and injustice that drive this epidemic."
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At the rally, a coalition of human rights and HIV/AIDS organizationspresented Piot and other high-level officials with a declaration that hadreceived resounding support from over 600 organizations in 105 countries. Thedeclaration, "Human Rights and HIV/AIDS: Now More Than Ever," represented themost significant outcry for HIV-related human rights protections ever at anInternational AIDS Conference. Groups representing human rights, HIV,development, public health, gender, and other issues showed unprecedentedsolidarity in endorsing the human rights declaration.
"This rally should mark a turning point in the global response to HIV,"said Jonathan Cohen, director of the Law and Health Initiative at the OpenSociety Institute's Public Health Program. "The demand that human rightsoccupy the center of the HIV response has united activists from all sectorsand corners of the world."
The declaration charges that universal access to HIV prevention,treatment, and care programs will never be achieved without a full range ofhuman rights protections for groups most affected by HIV. Groups such as womenand girls, injecting drug users, sex workers, men who have sex with men, andpeople in prison are the most in need of comprehensive HIV prevention andtreatment programs, yet they continue to face discrimination and abuse and areoften denied access to lifesaving programs. As a result, HIV continues tospread unchecked in communities worldwide.
"Stigma and discrimination are more devastating than AIDS, and its cost ismuch higher because it strains social relations and affects the enjoyment ofall human rights," said Emilio Alvarez Icaza, President of the Human RightsCommission of the Mexican Federal District.
According to the UNAIDS 2008 report released last week, people who aremost at risk for HIV have better access to HIV prevention services incountries that have laws that protect them against discrimination. Yet,one-third of countries have no law or regulation to protect people living withHIV from discrimination, and countries that do have anti-discrimination lawslargely fail to enforce them. At the same time, the United Nations estimatesthat 63 percent of countries still have laws and policies that impedeeffective HIV services. These include laws against same-sex sexual behavior,sex work, and possession of sterile syringes.
"Human rights should be at the core of everything we do," said MichelKazatchkine, Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosisand Malaria. "The fight against AIDS and the other major diseases in thedeveloping world is a fight for health and human dignity."
The lack of legal protections for African women, who comprise the majorityof infections on the continent worst-affected by HIV, best illustrates theneed to combine public health with human rights approaches. Under customarylaws throughout Africa, women are denied equal access to divorce, property,and inheritance. In many countries, governments do not aggressively prosecutedomes
