NLAAD

Today October 15 is National Latinx HIV and AIDS Awareness Day ( #NLAAD ), and I want to honor the life @ceciliagentili72 and countless other Latine advocates, organizers, artists, and community members like @labamby @raifderrazi @granvarones @the_wall_las_memorias !! Cecilia helped shift care and resources needed for sex workers , helped decriminalized sex work, advocated for migrant undocumented people, and led so many efforts for Trans health care and HIV/AIDS care. She was also a badass artist, writer, and performer. I want to remember her in this photo taken by @oscmdiaz 🌹 In these times when medical care and access is being stripped & defunded for many of our communities I lean into the power of community care and resources- which in lowest of times have held us in so many way!!

This years #NLAAD campaign theme is “Should I get tested for HIV? Yes!” ❤️There are so many local community led organizations and clinics that continue to offer free testing. Many of these sites are migrant and multi language friendly. And that’s what we need. HIV prevention strategies and treatments have to be culturally informed, multi lingual for our Latine baddies that speak other languages outside of English, and that are taking precautions to make sure people are feeling safe during these increase ICE raids. In our many Latine communities we still need to address and tackle HIV stigma- which gets in the way of folks getting treatment. According to the CDC Latine people account for 32% of the 37,891 new HIV diagnoses in the United States in 2022. And this percentage continues to increase . Not only do we need to do our part to get tested but we need to encourage our community members to get tested too. And it doesn’t stop there, we also need to continue to address all the barriers in health care that contribute to the HIV epidemic among Latine people. It means better health policies, it means more funding, it means supporting and lifting local efforts in the South ( which accounts for many of the new cases).