The rise of HIV research on and with people with disabilities

In the five years since the results of the Global Survey on HIV/AIDS and Disability were released, research on people with disabilities and their experiences with HIV has grown exponentially. Returning to the lens of the International AIDS Conferences, at the 2004 meeting in Bangkok, Prince Ngongo Bahati won a Young Researcher Award for his study on voluntary counselling and testing for people who are deaf. His work had been conducted in collaboration with Liverpool VCT Kenya, an organization working with and for deaf people, which has developed a leading model of VCT peer-counselling for people with disabilities [50, 72].

At the XVI International AIDS Conference in Toronto in 2006, the Canadian Working Group on HIV and Rehabilitation and the International Centre for Disability and Rehabilitation held two sessions on HIV and disabilities as a way to promote dialogue on these issues. Another event at the conference was entitled "Deaf People and HIV/AIDS: Time to Recognize the Problem".

Interest in this area was starting to grow.

By the time the XVII International AIDS Conference was held in Mexico City in 2008, disability held a significant place in the programme. A session in the formal programme, entitled "Beyond Barriers: Disabilities and AIDS", plus other research papers, were devoted to issues facing people with disabilities (see Appendix 1). There were also four disability-related satellite sessions led by AIDS-Free World, Disabled People International, Voluntary Service Overseas, the Catholic Organisation for Relief and Development Aid (Cordaid), and the Inter-American Institute on Disability and Inclusive Development (IIDI). Building on this momentum, the 2008 ICASA meeting, convened later that year, included two sessions focusing on disability and HIV. A further milestone was the 3rd LAC Technical Meeting on STDs, HIV/AIDS and Disability, held just prior to the conference. The event was co-organized by IIDI, the World Bank, the National Council to Prevent Discrimination (Mexico), the Central American Social Integration System, the National Program of STI and AIDS (Brazil), and the Pan-American Health Organization.

This dramatic rise in interest at the International AIDS Conference in 2008 prompted the creation of an Internet-based network on disability and HIV. This network is now a vibrant communication exchange tool with more than 160 researchers, activists and other stakeholders sharing information about research, advocacy developments, policies, meetings and publication opportunities [73]. Other networks, like the International Disability and Development Consortium (IDDC), which advocates internationally for the inclusion of disability, have also taken the issue of disability and HIV on board [74].

Jill Hanass-Hancock and Stephanie A Nixon

Health Economics and HIV/AIDS Research Division (HEARD), University of KwaZulu-Natal, South AfricaDepartment of Physical Therapy, University of Toronto, Canada, and Research Associate, HEARD, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa