Young people living with HIV have, with support from UNAIDS and youth leaders, begun an innovative and unprecedented partnership to strengthen South–South collaboration between networks of young people living with HIV in Latin America and the Caribbean and in Africa.
Young people living with HIV in both regions have for a long time organized in national and regional networks to advocate for increased access to HIV services. Now, through a new joint initiative called the 10 Questions Project, they will assess the organizational, advocacy and outreach capacities of networks of young people living with HIV globally, using social media tools, online surveys and in-depth interviews.
Through the initiative, lessons will be learned from each region’s ongoing efforts and from how young people living with HIV in each region participate in the AIDS response. The 10 Questions Project will outline and commit to common advocacy strategies and identify solutions to the challenges faced by young people living with HIV. The assessment will aim to better inform partners and key stakeholders, including donors, on investment choices for strengthening networks and organizations of young people living with HIV.
This joint effort between regions aligns with #uproot, a recently launched youth-led political agenda to end AIDS by 2030, which highlights the need to innovate and reinvigorate partnerships within the youth movement working on HIV, including between youth networks from countries in the global South.
UNAIDS is working to ensure that the world keeps its commitment made in the United Nations Political Declaration on Ending AIDS that 90% of young people have the skills, knowledge and capacity to protect themselves from HIV and have access to sexual and reproductive health services by 2020.
