Human Rights at AIDS 2024

Joseph J. Amon

The AIDS 2024 Conference officially opens today (Monday 22 July) in Munich, Germany, and virtually, with about 15,000 people registered to attend. For those not attending in person or virtually, the conference website has a searchable online program with 2,557 abstracts. In looking through the titles of posters and oral sessions, a number of themes around HIV and human rights will be addressed at the conference.

For example, the impact of discrimination and other barriers to HIV services is discussed in a number of presentations, including related to illegal immigrant sex workers in Ghana and in health care settings in Lebanon and South Africa, as well as among LGBT communities in the United States.

Human rights and community-led monitoring is highlighted, featuring programs in Ukraine and among sex workers in southern Africa.

HIV rights-based interventions frequently seek to empower populations—through legal literacy campaigns or access to justice and redress mechanisms. A number of results from these interventions are being presented, ranging from the Global Fund’s Breaking Down Barriers program in 20 countries to programs focused on youth empowerment in Uganda and Kenya.

Other topics include the impact of COVID-19 on human rights among people who use drugs in South Africa, PLHIV in Nigeria, and gay and bisexual men in Australia, and human rights monitoring as a tool for redress and advocacy, including in Ukraine.

The importance of paralegal programs is described in Thailand,  Kyrgyzstan, Indonesia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Another presentation focuses upon the work of paralegals in Georgia, Kazakhstan, and Moldova to overcome legal barriers and ensure that people who use drugs, MSM, and sex workers can access HIV care. The project, implemented by the Eurasian Harm Reduction Network, also worked with partners to document human rights violations and advocate for change.

Stay tuned for blog posts from the conference this week!

Joseph J. Amon, PhD, MSPH, is editor-in-chief of Health and Human Rights, and director of the Office of Global Health and a clinical professor at Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health, Philadelphia, United States.