World AIDS Day: “Global Solidarity, Shared Responsibility”

There’s a call for global solidarity to maintain H.I.V. services for those living with the virus. It’s a call heard across the world as Belize joins the international community in observing World AIDS Day. While it may be overshadowed by the socio-economic challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the message is to tackle this virus with the same vigor and resources – a message translated in this year’s World AIDS Day theme “Global Solidarity, Shared Responsibility”. Locally, the National AIDS Commission pushed this message with help from someone living with H.I.V. Here’s the story:

Andrea Polanco, Reporting

December first is World AIDS Day. The message this year is for HIV services and treatment to be accessible during and beyond the pandemic. It’s a call that the National AIDS Commission is championing by raising awareness through their client Dian Jones.

Dian Jones, HIV Positive

Dian Jones

“I got infected from my ex common-law who infected before me and didn’t tell me anything. It was this one day in December 2017 that I went out to town, me and my daughter and they were doing free testing and I was sitting there waiting for the result when one of the nurses came over and she said well you know you have to go to the hospital because you are positive now and I was like, what?”

Since she was diagnosed in 2017, Jones has never hidden her HIV status. But persons living with HIV still face discrimination and experience shame to access health services. But this can have serious and deadly implications.

Dian Jones

“I am a person I don’t believe too much in what people would say about me. I don’t care about that. Whether you want to come around and visit me that is up to you. I had a brother who was HIV positive but he was an HIV patient for nine years who neglected himself and refused to take his medication. I would like to advise everyone living with HIV if you are breathing, eating, feeling, walking or talking, please go and take your medication. Because a few years or months down the line you don’t want to go through and feel a lot of pain and I am saying this because I had to love that moment with my brother.”

Dian Jones now uses her HIV positive status and personal story to advocate for greater solidarity for persons living with HIV.

Dian Jones

“I would like to see people living with HIV being at peace in the community. I would like to see people stop – totally stop discriminating people like us living with HIV. I would like to see that we are one people that we are because we are all human beings and we need to be treated as such. I am a single mom of two; a boy and a girl. I love to dance. I love listening to music. I love being with my family. My name is Dian Jones and I am a Belizean living with HIV.”

Andrea Polanco Reporting for News Five.