NDP Commemorates World AIDS Day

QUEEN’S PARK – MPP Kristyn Wong-Tam, 2SLGBTQI+ Issues critic, released the following statement to mark World AIDS Day:

This World AIDS Day’s theme is “Overcoming disruption, transforming the AIDS response”. For decades, I have stood in solidarity with those living with HIV/AIDS, and those who fight to eradicate it. Today, solidarity demands blunt honesty. I know of no better way to honour a movement whose rallying cry has been Silence = Death.

To friends, families and allies working to end HIV/AIDS: the global response to combat HIV/AIDS is moving in the wrong direction. Our governments are losing the political will to save lives. HIV/AIDS never went away, and recent decisions will be an accelerant to its spread.

It is too easy to blame the Trump administration’s high-profile cuts to PEPFAR and USAID. Domestic funding by federal and provincial governments for HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment has not kept pace with inflation for decades. The Carney budget’s $2.7 billion cut to foreign aid will fall uniquely hard on global HIV/AIDS services that were already struggling to absorb Trump’s devastating defunding. Canada should be stepping up to fill the void created by America’s abandonment of global public health leadership, not joining President Trump in turning off the taps.

Sexually transmitted infections do not respect borders. The combined failure of wealthy countries to fund HIV/AIDS prevention and the flat-lining (at best) of services in Canada and Ontario here will expose everyone to more preventable infections.

Both federal and provincial governments have attacked HIV/AIDS prevention over the last year, through their combined assault on overdose prevention. The province’s forced closure of supervised consumption sites will worsen the spread of HIV/AIDS. The Carney government’s cut to the Substance Use and Addictions Program is the misguided abandonment of one of the only policies that can credibly combat the overdose crisis and the spread of HIV through unsafe needles. This capitulation to Conservatives by the Carney government is nothing short of a decision Pierre Poilievre could be proud of.

This World AIDS Day is also different because of the earlier announcement by the AIDS Committee of Toronto (ACT) that after 42 years of community service, they will permanently close their doors on March 31 next year. This announcement must be a wake-up call to all levels of government that AIDS organizations are facing a financial crisis that has been decades in the making.

This year, I do not want to simply thank everyone working in the HIV/AIDS sector. I want to offer the Ontario NDP’s partnership in fighting for the transformation of political leadership that communities living with HIV/AIDS deserve. I invite you to Queen’s Park in the weeks ahead to ensure that your voices are heard loud and clear by a government that has, by and large, ignored you. I will also repeat my call on the Ford government to show serious commitment on this World AIDS Day by passing my motion to extend coverage of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) through the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP).

This summer, I again participated in the Friends for Life Bike Rally, a six-day cycling fundraiser from Toronto to Montreal for the Toronto People With AIDS Foundation. PWA Toronto is one of the many organizations I keep in mind today as you work to support people living with HIV/AIDS and keep a spotlight pointed to the work ahead.

To everyone working in HIV/AIDS prevention, support, services, and harm reduction: thank you. This has been a brutally difficult year, and your work is more important than ever. I especially want to thank everyone at ACT for your decades of service to our City.

Thirty years ago, 1995 was one of the most challenging years in fighting the HIV/AIDs crisis. Deaths hit all-time highs in Canada and Ontario. But women, men, and gender-diverse people, people from Indigenous communities, Black communities, South-Asian communities, East-Asian communities, Middle-Eastern communities, Caribbean communities, African communities, and Latinx communities were organizing too. Their community organizing transformed our response and has saved lives today. Our history shows us that we can face horrifying odds and transform our government’s response. We must do so again.