Kampala Key, Vulnerable and Priority Populations (KVP) News

We at MARPS in Uganda, protest the ill-treatment of women, sexual minorities, sex-workers and people living with HIV.  We call upon the different African countries to rally together and come up with means ensuring economic development, job opportunities and quality sustenance for the populace.  Condemn the mistreatment of women in countries where they are promised jobs only to find they are to be enslaved and ill-treated.  We reiterate that there are still people living with HIV  who are missing HIV Prevention and Care Services. We vehemently denounce the deliberate disservice and impunity meted out to LGBTIQQ when they seek the very services to protect their dignity and ensure due diligence; the indiscriminate expulsion, evictions and other forms of abuses. Stop the abuses on the African continent. We are therefore going to stay off air for quite some time to show solidarity with  sexual minorities, sex-workers and people living with HIV.  ...

This is an article by Gus Cairns (August 2018). We are sharing it with you and hopefully, you will pick up some clues as to why PrEP uptake is slow in Africa.  Numerous PrEP initiation projects started in the last year – but retention is a problem. This year, 2018, will be the year that a really significant number of people in Africa started HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP),  the AIDS2018 conference in Amsterdam  heard last week. PrEP was probably the dominant subject at this year’s conference – there were far more sessions devoted to it than any other topic – and even more notable was the fact that the majority of them concerned PrEP in Africa and in populations other than gay men and men who have sex with men. Pilot PrEP projects have been underway in some African countries for several years. But it has only been since late 2017 that some countries – notably Kenya and South Africa, and also eSwatini, which is the new name for Swaziland – have started ser...

Q and A Forum: Competencies needed for health literacy. In order to accomplish tasks, individuals may need to be: Visually literate (able to understand graphs or other visual information); computer literate (able to operate a computer); information literate (able to obtain and apply relevant information); numerically or computationally literate (able to calculate or reason numerically).

Patients are often faced with complex information and treatment decisions.  Patients need to: Have oral language skills to articulate their health concerns and describe their symptoms accurately; access health care services; analyze relative risks and benefits; calculate dosages; communicate with healthcare providers; evaluate information for credibility and quality; interpret test results; locate health information.

Q and A Forum: Health literacy is a necessary life promoting skill. It is the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions. It means reading, listening, analytical, and decision-making skills, as well as the ability to apply these skills to health situations.

A culture in which all actors are allowed to obtain and benefit from information, education and communication that help us better understand and utilize health services or engage in life promoting practices.  This is irrespective of cultural backgrounds, belief systems, communication styles, and understanding and response to health information, education and communication.  

There are different places where safe medical male circumcision is done in Uganda.  USAID/Uganda HIV/AIDS and Health Initiates at Workplaces Activity-HIWA provide FREE Medical Male Circumcision at Kibuli Police Health Center.  For HIV prevention, improved personal hygiene and reduction of spread & acquisition of STDs. For details call on out Toll free line 0800 100 700.

Breastfeeding is life promoting.  This holds true even for HIV positive mothers.  Breastfeeding is safe and of great benefit to your baby. Ask your health worker on safe breastfeeding practices.

People will admire leaders who address their needs more or leaders who deliver most. Leaders should focus more on working for the fulfillment of their people’s interests which include sustenance, security, order,   peace, health, education and creating conducive environments to do business.

Q and A Forum: Receiving treatment is critically important. It contributes to individual health, survival and to epidemic control of HIV. Data continue to mount showing that viral suppression greatly reduces the risk of continued transmission — whether sexual or perinatal — of the virus.

Q and A Forum: Global health, human solidarity and effort can turn back the HIV epidemic. The United Nations agencies, led by the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the World Health Organization (WHO), have committed to the goals of ending the AIDS pandemic as a public health threat by 2030 and ensuring that by 2020, 90% of people with HIV infection know they have it, 90% of those infected are receiving ART, and sustained viral suppression is achieved in 90% of those receiving treatment.

Formerly serodiscordant couples can turn positive:  Several  HIV transmissions in serodiscordant couples occur when the HIV-infected partner has a high CD4 count, after being tested and end up being ineligible for antiretroviral therapy (ART) in settings where it is hard to get ARVs or where guidelines recommend treatment at CD4 counts below 500 or below 350.

Q and A Forum: Closeted And Out Couples Is Another Form of Discordancy. Love is  idealized as both partners having same level of readiness to make their relationship work. This creates normative expectations of the kind of love expected and who couples would want to be with. But for visibility-discordant couples, the pain of exclusion from this ideal has consequences. They may not express themselves freely and may avoid social events because of perceived idealized femininity and masculinity. 

Q and A Forum: Taking PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) does  not  affect feminizing hormone levels in transgender women. F eminizing hormone therapy regimen of estradiol valerate (2 mg/day), a form of the female hormone estrogen, plus the androgen blocker cyproterone acetate (25 mg/day) or body building anabolic drugs can be taken side by side with PrEP.

Q and A Forum: Tell Us About The "Minority Stress." A tendency  for communities to prioritize what the majority does and dismiss the minority. There are consequences for LGBTIQQ communities. Because of isolation, they may not have opportunities to engage in life improving non-sedentary sports. They are liable to  heightened risk of both mental and physical health problems . In political parlance, this stress is as a result of misalignment or incongruent public ideas on sexuality, identity and orientation norms vis-a-vis heterosexuality and homosexuality.   

Separation of state law and religion are paramount. The law should be used to promote the  protection of LGBTQ people from persecution under the law.  Religious liberty is distinct from no religious persecution by  anti-LGBTI and anti-choice groups.  Freedom of speech, of religion, from want, from fear should be the parameters for Law and Religion.

Domestic violence is despicable whether in Gay or Straight Settings. Yes! It is against the law, it is an abuse to one's dignity, it is disrespectful, contributes to depression and low self esteem.  It may lead to suicides in the extreme cases.

Q and A Forum: Gays Contribute To Self Inflicted Trauma. Yes! This sets a stage for self-inflicted traumas including: sexual racism, transphobia, biphobia, versaphobia, queer-shaming, effeminate-shaming, masculinity-shaming, sado-masochism, fat-shaming, penis-size glorification, sexual events one has performed, abandonment of spouses, one night stands, abandonment remorse, obsession with sexualized lifestyle, pretentious elitism and many forms of discrimination and stigma.