Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin – Leader of the Greens) – Madam Speaker, in three weeks’ time, on 5 June, it will be International HIV Long-Term Survivors Day. It is a day set aside each year to honour and recognise the people who are a group called the Long‑Term Survivors of HIV‑AIDS and to raise awareness about their particular needs and issues. It is an important day in the history of HIV-AIDS in the world.
It was 43 years ago that a cluster of cases was identified by the Centers for Disease Control in the United States. AIDS arrived unannounced, unwelcome and unwanted. There was a cluster of cases amongst what were previously healthy young men. It was the first official reporting of the AIDS epidemic. It was at that time exclusively amongst young gay men in Los Angeles. It was a horrifying and rapid escalation, a spread of disease, frightening. It took the lives of many young people – many young beautiful gay men, in particular – at that time. It was a whole generation, really, of young gay men who died in a short period of time.
Things have changed a lot since then. HIV still exists and so does AIDS in many parts of the world. What also still exists is the need for people with HIV-AIDS to be recognised as people with personhood, people who have a right to live without stigma and the shame that has for so long been part and parcel of people’s responses to a person with HIV and AIDS. Having HIV was, for many decades, a death sentence. Since the advent of antiretrovirals, very effective antiretroviral therapies in 1996, it is now entirely possible to live a flourishing and active life with HIV. In fact, 98 per cent of people in Australia who are diagnosed with HIV and take antiretroviral therapies will have non-detectable virus load in their bodies. That means they do not go on to progress symptoms of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome – AIDS.
There are still 28,870 people living in Australia with HIV-AIDS. That is a very large number. About 50 per cent of them are gay men. The rest are not gay men. So it is not a disease, a virus, which just afflicts people who are gay. It is potentially spread throughout the community. We need to be aware of that. Australia was the first and best place in the world to create a safe sex – and what followed from that – a harm-minimisation program as a response to the HIV pandemic.
Safe sex and safe drug use is still very much with us today, and is a key part of how we keep people safe in the community from transmitting sexually transmitted viruses. We thank the people in the community who do the work of providing safe sex education and the advice that people need.
World AIDS Day brings together people from around the world. It is a fantastic opportunity to talk about the treatment and care options around the world. I acknowledge the work of local organisation Positive Lives of Tasmania. I want to particularly thank their secretary, Wayne Hornsbury, and the National Association of People with HIV Australia, who together, have been working across Australia and in Tasmania to bring awareness and support for the people who are long-term survivors of HIV. Positive Lives Tasmania is a community-led organisation. It works specifically on the health and well-being of people who are living long term with HIV-AIDS.
On behalf of the Greens, I acknowledge the lives and the struggles and the courage of long-term survivors of HIV and their continuing resilience and love of life. Many of them live without the many friends they had decades ago, but together here in Tasmania, they create a community of strength and joy. On behalf of the Greens and the people of the Parliament of Tasmania, I look forward to celebrating with them their love of life on Long Term Survivors Day on 5 June.
