{"id":20317,"date":"2014-07-25T11:13:05","date_gmt":"2014-07-25T01:13:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nofibs.com.au\/?p=20317"},"modified":"2019-04-13T23:57:56","modified_gmt":"2019-04-13T13:57:56","slug":"call-an-end-to-hivaids-weasel-words-burgewords-creatingwaves-on-aids2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/call-an-end-to-hivaids-weasel-words-burgewords-creatingwaves-on-aids2014\/","title":{"rendered":"Call an end to HIV\/AIDS weasel words: @burgewords #CreatingWaves on #AIDS2014"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Chinese<\/a>

Chinese students show a handmade red ribbon one day ahead of the World AIDS Day, 2009. (Source: World AIDS Day)<\/p><\/div>\n

THE world has been watching Melbourne this week as the city hosts the 20th International AIDS Conference<\/a>. Despite initial reports from the event focusing understandably on the delegates killed by the missile attack on their flight over eastern Ukraine, the conference agenda hit the airwaves visibly on this week\u2019s episode of QandA<\/i>.<\/p>\n

As a result a range of new and unfamiliar language has been\u00a0presented to mainstream and social media audiences. From \u2018Sero-Discordant Relationship\u2019, \u2018PEP\u2019, \u2018PrEP\u2019, \u2018TasP\u2019, \u2018ART\u2019 and \u2018PMTCT\u2019 to phrases like \u2018heteronormative\u2019 and \u2018men who have sex with men\u2019, Australians have been getting a higher-than-average dose of HIV\/AIDS-related vocabulary.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately the word use is not coming with enough\u00a0interpretation. \u2018Conference-style\u2019 or \u2018industry-speak\u2019 acronyms and sound bites occur in every sector, but with its \u2018Stepping Up The Pace\u2019 mission statement, this particular conference and its media delegates could have done with more plain talking and less weasel words to get the important messages about HIV\/AIDS through to the communities they are seeking to engage.<\/p>\n

With new HIV infection levels in Australia at a 20-year high<\/a>, one of those communities is surely ours. Surprising survey results<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0Queensland’s\u00a0high-level ignorance about how HIV is acquired hit the mainstream media just\u00a0a week after the conference.<\/p>\n

The international conference has a focus on tackling new infections and raised questions about the direction new HIV\/AIDS awareness campaigns should take, considering the scare-factor of the Grim Reaper ad campaign of the late 1980s, and new data which reveals the 96 per cent <\/a>protection rate for sero-discordant sexual encounters if one of the partners is being treated with ARV.<\/p>\n

If you’re confused it’s\u00a0no wonder. I thought I knew plenty about HIV\/AIDS, but, like\u00a0writer and HIV activist\u00a0Nic Holas\u00a0<\/span>who was on the QandA<\/em> panel,\u00a0<\/span>I am torn about whether this should be an opinion piece or a community service announcement.<\/p>\n

\n

I believe unlocking the acronyms will help.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

One of the terms the conference has chosen to focus on is \u2018Men who have Sex with Men<\/a>\u2019 (MSM), although the\u00a0focus is mainly on this HIV\/AIDS risk group overseas.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a key objective of the 20th International AIDS Conference to shine a light on those men who have sex with men, sex workers, transgender people and people who use drugs who do not have the same access to treatment, care and prevention as their western colleagues may do,\u201d UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidib\u00e9 said at the start of the conference.<\/p>\n

Ever since the phrase was coined in the 1990s as a means of de-stigmatising HIV infections which were the result of heterosexual men who engaged in sex with other men, it has sat rather uninterpreted outside the HIV\/AIDS community.<\/p>\n

But is it\u00a0effective when addressing Australians in the media?<\/p>\n

To answer that it\u2019s important to underline that MSM does not mean \u2018gay\u2019 or \u2018homosexual\u2019, in fact the term was invented to shield MSMs from any hint of \u2018gay\u2019.<\/p>\n

Many in the gay community have sexual encounters with MSMs in sex-on-premises businesses (read: \u2018saunas\u2019 and\/or \u2018bathhouses\u2019) or at beats (read: \u2018public toilets\u2019, although beats are also located at road-stops, sports fields, and can often crop-up right in the high street at bookshops or other businesses).<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t take long at a gathering of gay men for the stories about baby seats in the backs of cars at beats, or wives dropping husbands at saunas, to enter the conversation with an awkward mixture of laughter and understanding. MSM do not identify as \u2018gay\u2019 and they (and therefore their heterosexual sexual partners) remain\u00a0at very high risk <\/a>of HIV infection, in part because they tend\u00a0not to get tested regularly.<\/p>\n

Post Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP<\/a>) is a mouthful, but it\u2019s also something the Australian community could\u00a0develop a greater understanding of. Available at most hospital emergency departments, and essential to start before 72 hours have passed since exposure to the HIV virus, PEP is a four-week course of anti-HIV medication with a decent success rate.<\/p>\n

Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP<\/a>) is similar, but it\u2019s engaged as a means of preventing HIV infection. Sero-discordant couples (when one partner is HIV positive and the other is HIV negative) are in the demographic which can benefit from PrEP, including couples who are trying conceive a child while protecting the uninfected partner from contracting HIV.<\/p>\n

Treatment as Prevention (TasP<\/a>) is an approach to HIV prevention which acknowledges that a sexual partner taking antiretroviral (ARV) medication has a greatly-reduced viral load (the amount of HIV virus in body fluids). It\u2019s important to acknowledge that ARV\u2019s side-effects means this form of treatment program is not for everyone.<\/p>\n

TasP has made a significant difference in Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission (PMTCT<\/a>) of HIV during breastfeeding.<\/p>\n

\u2018Heteronormative<\/a>\u2019 is a term that has often cropped-up in HIV\/AIDS debates, generally at the queer theory end of the spectrum, and it\u2019s used to tackle the assumption that gender and sexual orientation fall into fixed categories of \u2018man\u2019 and \u2018woman\u2019 according to abstract \u2018laws of nature\u2019 that have led to the shaming of same-sex attracted people.<\/p>\n

Such stigmatising only increases<\/a> the conditions in which higher rates of HIV infection occur, no matter which country you live in.<\/p>\n

\"HIV<\/a>

FAST RESULTS: An HIV rapid test kit.<\/p><\/div>\n

There are many other new elements to HIV\/AIDS, from home\u00a0testing and rapid testing at clinics (which have the potential to ensure a higher rate of MSM testing), to new measures for\u00a0assisting the ongoing health of long-infected PLWHA (\u2018People Living With HIV\/AIDS\u2019).<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a veritable alphabet of acronyms which many LGBTQI (there we go again) remain grateful for because this kind of language aims to avoid assumptions of \u2018victims\u2019 and blame.<\/p>\n

While it\u2019s tempting for Australians to believe that HIV\/AIDS in a third-world issue, that we have tackled the problem, and there is plenty of good news to get our heads around, the issue of how to communicate that message without an increase in new HIV infections is now one of the main HIV\/AIDS challenges facing Australia.\u00a0I believe unlocking the acronyms will help.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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