Daisy Kwala

Daisy Kwala

What inspires you to work in the HIV field? My inspiration is a healthy society. This is a society where everyone's human rights are respected and not violated, where access to care is upheld through creation of a stigma-free society for all, including adolescents, young girls and key populations. I am inspired to be part of the journey of HIV reduction through advocacy to reduce new HIV acquisitions and to include communities in policy formation. This will improve outcomes of service delivery to key populations, which are our brothers and sisters. So, quality service uptake for them equals a healthy society for all. As a sex worker openly living with HIV, I'm inspired to work and bring change for the community of sex workers living with HIV with whom I identify to improve our health outcomes. As a health rights activist, I believe that most treatment outcomes are based on the quality of service delivery offered by healthcare providers to our clients. I am able to combine both those aspects and be a part of this great journey of change making by acting as an example to my healthcare providers to change their attitude and offer stigma-free services to everyone, including key populations, for improved health outcomes. What are your goals as an IAS change maker? As a health rights activist, my goals as a change maker are to: advocate for quality healthcare service delivery and uptake by key populations; work with others within the health sector to reduce stigma and discrimination towards key populations, which hinders service uptake; create awareness among my healthcare providers that reduction of new HIV acquisitions and access to HIV care and management all starts and stops with us and that our attitude in service delivery industry plays a key role in HIV management and prevention; and interact with scientists and others worldwide to learn and interact about an HIV cure and management. As an IAS change maker, my goal is to reduce stigma in our healthcare systems and improve service uptake and delivery to key populations, especially the female sex worker community. It will delight my soul to see the community I identify with able to receive services without fear of discrimination, to see people living with HIV able to achieve viral suppression and improved health outcomes observed from all service delivery points and new skills developed in offering person-centred care models.

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Baker Bakashaba

Baker Bakashaba

What inspires you to work in the HIV field? As a young boy, I watched HIV and AIDS decimate communities around me and leave countless orphans and vulnerable widows. Treatments were inaccessible and also very expensive. With the opportunity of being a medical doctor, I decided to contribute to making treatments for HIV and co-infections accessible so that AIDS-related deaths could be curbed. I also wanted to contribute to reducing new HIV acquisitions by making available technologies accessible to the communities that need them. To me, putting the people affected by and/or living with HIV at the centre of the response is the most sustainable way to ensure that programmes adequately respond to the communities that need these services; I aim to make a contribution to that. What are your goals as an IAS change maker? My goals are to: Contribute to shaping the terrain for people-centred care through contributing to the body of evidence from implementation science and research. Champion engagement of recipients of care in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of differentiated service delivery models across programmes in various countries.

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Rod Olete

Rod Olete

What inspires you to work in the HIV field? It is inspiring to have the opportunity to see the lives of people living with HIV improve because of the health programmes, research and community empowerment that we do. What are your goals as an IAS change maker? As an IAS change maker, I aspire to learn and develop programmes that strike a balance between biomedical interventions and social determinants of HIV care.

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Tung Doan Thanh

Tung Doan Thanh

What inspires you to work in the HIV field? In 2008, I moved from a village to the big city to study. I had absolutely no information about HIV or safe sex. It was a long time before I learnt that I was vulnerable to HIV through unprotected sex. I was supported mentally by a peer educator and referred to HIV testing. It meant a lot to me. I know that there are many people like me: young people from rural areas with limited knowledge, poor access to HIV and sexual health services, and suffering multi stigma. That's why I decided to become a peer educator and now an activist, public practitioner and community health worker. The personal stories, smiles, tears and positive changes in the lives of the people I have talked to and helped are the big motivations for me to continue working in the HIV field. What are your goals as an IAS change maker? As an IAS change maker, my goal is to inspire young people, key population members and people living with HIV to speak out strongly for their rights and health. I want to inspire them to connect with other change makers to advocate for community-led programmes, community-centred models and appropriate investments in communities, as well as participate actively in education, service delivery and support for community.

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Quick links to our activities

Closing scientific gaps

Collaborative Initiative for Paediatric HIV Education and Research (CIPHER) Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise Towards an HIV Cure

Disseminating the latest research

IAS Educational Fund Journal of the International AIDS Society (JIAS)

Improving health services

Community-Led Monitoring Differentiated Service Delivery Heart of Stigma Mark Wainberg Fellowship Programme Person-Centred Care Youth Hub

Conferences

International AIDS Conference IAS Conference on HIV Science HIV Research for Prevention Conference

Get involved

Become an IAS change maker Corporate Partnership Programme Me and My Healthcare Provider IAS membership

The IAS promotes the use of non-stigmatizing, people-first language. The translations are all automated in the interest of making our content as widely accessible as possible. Regretfully, they may not always adhere to the people-first language of the original version.