A panel of experts with backgrounds in advocacy, policy, research and on-the-ground programs will combine their unique perspectives to discuss how sexual and reproductive health services, including family planning, can strengthen and complement HIV prevention efforts. Special emphasis will be given to the importance of services that address the sexual and reproductive health needs of those living with HIV.
The satellite session is titled "Meeting the Sexual and Reproductive Health Needs of People Living with HIV: Critical to Human Rights and HIV Prevention" and will take place on Sunday, August 3, from 15:45 to 17:45 in Room SBR 5 at the Centro Banamex in Mexico City. It will include the following panelists:
- Heather Boonstra, Guttmacher Institute
- Morolake Odetoyinbo, Global Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (GNP+)
- Rose Wilcher, Family Health International
- Anna Miller, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation
The speakers will draw on their personal and their organizations’ experience and expertise to address the varied benefits of, and challenges to, integration. Four short presentations, followed by a Q&A session, will include the following highlights:
Heather Boonstra will provide an overview of the issue of integration. She will discuss the existing global consensus in support of integration and the hurdles that attempts to implement programs have nevertheless encountered, including ideological opposition from influential U.S. social conservatives. She will also provide an update on global advocacy efforts and how the issue of integration fared during the renewal of the U.S. global AIDS program, PEPFAR.
Morolake Odetoyinbo will talk about the sexual and reproductive health needs and aspirations of people living with HIV—drawing on personal experience and evidence of what services HIV-positive men and women say they want and need, which range from sexual health information and counseling to prenatal care to ensure healthy pregnancy, contraceptive services to prevent unwanted pregnancy and safe abortion services, when needed.
Rose Wilcher will highlight the right of women to freely decide the number and spacing of their children and will discuss the evidence on how meeting the contraceptive needs of HIV-positive women is essential to global HIV prevention efforts. She will also discuss the logistical and country-level challenges to integration.
Anna Miller will discuss efforts to integrate sexual and reproductive health services into programs to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV, with a special focus on ensuring that women have healthy pregnancies and healthy babies and are provided with the family planning services they need and want.
Click here for more information on:
Meeting the Sexual and Reproductive Health Needs of People Living with HIV
The Role of Contraception in Preventing HIV