Communities Lead...

 

The theme of this years World AIDS Day, was, "Let communities lead."  I think it's great.  Some of the only people who will ever have any influence in some HIV impacted communities are people from it.  For too long, we've continued with the outside professional model.  The problems with this are plentiful.

Outsiders, are just that, outsiders.  They may not have the understanding to deal with specifics of a given group.  There could be many accusations made.  The providers may be considered to be ignorant, racist or having a savior approach.  For decades we've expected medical providers to handle sociocultural issues they weren't equipped to handle, nor was it their job.

It's time to let communities handle these matters.  It's time for communities to actually handle these matters & not ignore them.  The previous model was only so successful & it wasn't enough.  Let's see how this goes.

Cya...