HIV/AIDS and Disability The need for advocacy Jessica de Ruijter August

VSO VSO is an international development organisation working in 34 countries in Africa and Asia. Focus on capacity building through: –Volunteering, training & workshops, study tours etc –Advocacy Focus on 6 goals –HIV & AIDS, Disability, Health, Education, Secure Livelihood, Participation & Governance

Advocacy on HIV and disability VSO’s experience Started this year Why HIV & AIDS and disability? –VSO is supporting good programmes –Advocacy based on these experiences –Only few organisations active in NL

VSO’s HIV & AIDS and disability programmes Overview of VSO project experiences In 9 countries HIV & disability programmes Main activities are: Providing accessible information and services Awareness raising among the disability community Disability training for HIV organisation Advocacy

VSO’s HIV&AIDS and disability programmes Mainly in African countries and India, Vietnam Majority are disability organisations that include HIV in their programmes.

Goal of VSO’s advocacy Advocate for inclusive policies and programmes, through 1.Raising awareness 2.Provide tools to mainstream: - disability in HIV programmes and - HIV in disability programmes.

Building national coalitions In the Netherlands no or very little attention for disability and HIV Disability and HIV Working Group established. Working group has same advocacy objectives.

Activities of the working group Produce materials like folder, articles Organise workshops, training and seminar Lobby: –input for UNGASS –Input for the new Dutch policy around HIV and sexual and reproductive health.

Building international coalitions Working group at European level established. International agencies like: –Africa Campaign –AIDS Free World

Experiences so far Very difficult to get disability on the HIV agenda of the Ministry - unsucessful at getting disability in the UNGASS statement - low expectations for getting disability in the new policy

Experiences so far Why not successful, the response we get: Cannot do everything NL has not much experience in this, wants to focus in the new policy on what NL is good in. Tired of another ‘new’ target group

Experiences so far continued Difficult to get development organisations involved eg: –Workshop proposal for Dutch AIDS conference not approved Give similar arguments, cannot do everything, no experience etc

Conclusion A lot of work needs to be done, but we have just started. It is a long process, step by step But by working together we will achieve results Vienna here we come!!