Kevin Maloney

Never before has the hashtag #HIV or #AIDS trended on Twitter, not even on World AIDS Day. With over 100 million users on Twitter and with a few months of preparation until the International AIDS Conference (IAC) is to be hosted in the USA (Washington, D.C.) from July 22-27, four HIV/AIDS activists have come together to assemble a team of faces and voices who will encourage the global community to tweet heavily during this week using the hashtags, #HIV, #AIDS and #IAC.

Together, through this campaign, we [the global community] can, we must, make #HIV and #AIDS a trend. This is a HUGE opportunity to bring much-needed awareness to the HIV/AIDS, global epidemic.

Referencing the latest figure from the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors (NASTAD), as of February 23, 2012,  4,251 individuals across 11 states are on the AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP) waitlist. These are individuals who are uninsured or underinsured who have received an HIV+ diagnosis, and are unable to properly attain the drugs they need to remain alive, healthy and productive.

In support of the following letter sent to Gilead from the Fair Pricing Coalition, and signed by individual members, the FPC outlines its concerns, and requests specific actions be taken by Gilead. Any interested individual or organization is welcomed, and encouraged to sign on. Please share WIDELY across your networks:

Having recently moved I am now unpacking and you know that one box we all have with pictures, notes, etc. from our ex's? Every couple years or so you'll open that box, because you remember how happy you were at that moment in time, and you need to read the notes to reassure yourself you are still that same person, that you are still loveable and deserve love again.

Now, if it was a bad break-up, any and all notes were destroyed, ripped up or burned. The memories faded and forgotten. Though, I think we all have that one person we'd like to know about today, how are they, what path in life did they choose, are they married, single, with kids or not? How might life have been if you stayed together, re-kindled your relationship? Maybe the break up was for the best? Maybe you just didn't know at the time.

As goes Ohio, so could the Nation. The Ohio Health Department is putting up a strong fight to lower the federal poverty limit from its height of 500% in July 2010, lowered to 300% at that time, to now have the ability to implement a potential income eligibility change to as low as 100 % FPL at anytime with no notice to anyone with a stroke of pen. If that rule had gone into effect, it would mean in order to qualify for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program a single individual cannot make more than $10,890 a year in order to be eligible. Further, ODH could implement medical criteria one must also meet. Those given the highest priority will be PLWHA who’s CD4 counts are lower than 201. The medical criterion makes no mention of an important aspect of HIV care which is the Viral Load.