Support to AIDS 2016 Durban South Africa

This project represents Canada’s support to the annual International AIDS Conference for 2016 held in Durban South Africa. The five-day conference convenes over 20 000 delegates drawn from a diverse and voluntary pool of academics activists planners and practitioners worldwide. Under the Conference theme “Access Equity Rights Now” three thousand presentations papers and workshops explore the evidence and chart way forward for ending AIDS. As part of the conference theme the focus is on global targets for diagnosing treating and reducing transmission of 90 percent of people living with HIV/AIDS. The cross-cutting themes of gender equality human rights and innovation are front and centre as are the most vulnerable populations such as young women and girls. This is the eighth time that Global Affairs Canada (GAC) supports the International AIDS Conference and as part of AIDS 2016 has increased its contribution to include support for a pre-conference workshop on “treatment as prevention” be co-convened by Dr. Julio Montaner from the BC Centre for HIV/AIDS.

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) increased collaboration and partnership in HIV/AIDS programming including partnership across sectors; (2) enhanced policy commitments to evidence-based human rights-affirming HIV; and (3) AIDS responses that reflect the latest scientific evidence HIV funding requirements and the needs of key populations particularly women and girls.