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HEALTH The 6th International AIDS Society (IAS) Conference, the world's largest open scientific conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention, took place last July in Rome, Italy and Miami Living's HIV/AIDS expert Filippo von Schloesser was in attendance. It was held in the exquisite Flaminio District, at the Auditorium Parco della Musica, a venue normally reserved as a concert hall performance space designed by Italy's most well-known contemporary architect, Renzo Piano, who is best known for his work on the Centre Pompidou in Paris. "The conference represented an opportune moment in time to delve deeper into the most relevant clinical research issues on HIV/AIDS and related diseases," Filippo said. "I was elected representative of the Civil Society Forum (CFS) and addressed the opening lecture to an audience of 3.000 researchers, clinicians and community representatives from all over the world." This conference, which attracts around 5,000 delegates from all over the world every two-years; is a unique opportunity for all these experts to explore practical ways in which scientific advancement has helped make the lives of those living with HIV/AIDS a lighter road to travel. Thus Filippo's involvement with CFS allows him to represent those living with HIV/AIDS by helping to implement non- governmental policy development by acting as an informal advisory body to the European Think Tank. "As it happened in the most recent conferences such as the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy (ICAAC) and the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), studies on HIV prevention have taken the lead," Filippo pointed out. "The sentence that just a year ago was considered revolutionary: treatment is prevention, is now entering the routine of the concepts presented at the conferences." But what does this mean? And why speak about it? "First, as we mentioned in the past, because no cure currently exists. treatment is prevention from death, illnesses and immune-deficiency for an individual with HIV," Filippo explained. "Second, during the last two years, more and more clinical studies have been presented to demonstrate that the HIV positive person, who is on treatment, takes his therapy with no mistakes, is regularly checked, and has no detectable viral load for at least 6 months, will not spread the virus." "If the virus is not present in the bloodstream, there are very few chances that it can be passed to another individual through sexual intercourse: so, it's important to stress that treatment is also prevention from HIV for the general population," Filippo said. "One particular study conducted by Dr. Julio Montaner, an infectivologist, (whose many accomplishments include being the former President of the International AIDS Society; and is currently Professor of Medicine and Chair in AIDS Research, The University of British Columbia) shows that all sero-discordant couples given antiretroviral therapy in the last 6 years in British Columbia, only one person passed his virus to his partner, because he was failing his therapy due to lack of adherence to the doctor's prescriptions." Dr. Montaner is very outspoken about his views on stigma, discrimination, persecution and criminalization against infected and at risk populations resulting in misguided policies and misallocated resources. "This year's IAS Conference enabled fellow presenters and delegates an opportunity to sign the Vienna Declaration at the Human Rights Rally in order to stand up and be heard as they marked Vienna's stand to end stigma and discrimination in the global HIV/AIDS epidemic," Filippo said. "The conference's impact should promote the constant need for voluntary HIV checks in the general population in order to attack the virus as soon as it's found in the blood. Consequently, this might help increase the amount of individuals who want to be tested, thereby decreasing the amount of people who carry HIV for years, without knowing, passing it to confident partners and reaching the point of no-return." And in passing, it's necessary to again point out that the Vatican, represented by Archbishop Francis Chullikatt, Permanent Observer of the Holy See, continues to close its eyes to the problem and possible solution. In fact, this past summer, while speaking at the High-Level United Nations Meeting, he continued to state that, "The Holy See does not endorse the use of condoms as part of HIV and AIDS prevention programs or classes/programs of education in sex/sexuality. Prevention programs or classes/programs of education in human sexuality should focus not on trying to convince the world that risky and dangerous behavior forms part of an acceptable lifestyle, but rather should focus on risk avoidance, which is ethically and empirically sound. The only safe and completely reliable method of preventing the sexual transmission of HIV is abstinence before marriage and respect and mutual fidelity within marriage, which is and must always be the foundation of any discussion of prevention and support." There's no doubt that the Vatican continues to live in the dark ages by continuing to show its ignorance in this matter. However, if it wasn't for The New Zealand AIDS Foundation (NZAF) advocating for gay and bisexual men to be prioritized for the first time at such a meeting, the world would not have access to the fact that stigmatization still alarmingly exists within the walls of the Vatican, which is astounding to the general public. Shaun Robinson, NZAF Executive Director, says "those with conservative values represented at the UN have been very opposed to naming the groups of people most affected by HIV. But we think it's essential to recognize who's at risk because if you can't even name the people who are affected, you certainly can't target them with HIV prevention initiatives, so this meeting has been very important." "The Vatican's continuous claims that only the 'natural moral order' is what's to be used as the only tool to fight against HIV/AIDS, is still its stance after thirty-years since the world first learned of this disease needs to change," Filippo said. "It's shocking that the concept of non-traditional marriages and programs for 'harm reduction' is ignored, particularly in face of the millions of people who have died of AIDS and the millions of orphans that this disease has produced throughout the world. The Vatican still mixes the concept of human repoduction and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. The Catholic Church, because of its outlook in dealing with this devastating disease is becoming less and less relevant in the lives of human beings today. And more so, because of it's backward thinking, one could go so far to say its causing the disease to spread because of its outdated attitude." Jane Adolphe, Associate Professor of Law at the Ave Maria School of Law, agreed with Archbishop Chullikatt, but proposed a starting point between the two opposing sides of this unending health crisis. "If we recognize that the human person can and should change irresponsible and dangerous behavior, rather than simply accepting such behavior as if it was inevitable and unchangeable," she stated. "Policies, programs and political statements are without meaning if we don't recognize the human dimension of this disease in the men, women and children who are living with and affected by HIV/AIDS." Oh boy – and around and around we go. For more information on the IAS Conference, go to: ias2011.org; CSF, civilsocietyforum.org; ICAAC, icaac.org, and on CROI, retroconference.org. ML MIAMI LIVING 85