Website for MSM health launched in East Africa

Men who have sex with men (MSM) living in East Africa, where homophobia is on the rise, now have access to a unique website, Afya4Men.info, which contains comprehensive sexual health information targeted to their specific needs.

“Specific MSM medical competence has already been developed in these countries but due to often hostile environments, in many instances including criminalisation of male-to-male sex, has resulted in a lack of localised relevant information being freely available to MSM themselves,” said Prof James McIntyre, CEO of Anova.  Afya4Men.info is entirely bilingual, offering information in both Swahili and English. Read More 

35 gay activists attacked in Zimbabwe

A dozen unidentified men Friday (19 December) crashed an end-of-year party thrown by the Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe at a private venue in the capital Harare.

'The unidentified men entered the venue and started beating people using logs, iron bars, empty beer bottles and clenched fists. The men also demanded cash and gadgets from the members present in the hall whilst attacking them.' Read More

Zimbabwe Government to create HIV programme for gays

The government is going to create a specific HIV /AIDS programme targeting homosexuals and sex workers as a way of controlling the infection rate, a senior government official has revealed. This is the first time the government has publicly acknowledged the existence of this minority population sector and said it would include it in its national programmes.

Homosexuality has been politicized by President Robert Mugabe who is on record denouncing the practice. As a result of Mugabe’s anti-gay stance officials have routinely reserved their comments on gay issues. The Zimbabwean gay community has continued to complain about being left out of government programmes, saying that this fuels the spread of the HIV virus. Read More

At Least 594 LGBT People Were Murdered In The Americas In A 15-Month Period

A report just released identified 594 people believed to be LGBT were murdered between the beginning of 2013 and the end of March, 2014. The victims include four who were decapitated.

The count was compiled by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), which is an arm of the Organization of American States. In addition to the 594 killed, an additional 176 people survived “serious attacks.” The IACHR said the real count of LGBT people killed or assaulted during this period is likely higher than these figures suggest, because the majority of countries in the Americas do not track hate crimes targeting LGBTI people. As governments do little documentation of such crimes, this count was largely compiled from media accounts and reports by activist organizations, and many crimes may have gone unreported. Read More

U.S. Kicks African Nation From Trade Agreement Over Anti-LGBT Crackdown

The decision to drop the small West African nation from special trade status under the African Growth and Opportunity Act of 2000 came late Tuesday afternoon, just after media in the Gambia announced that three men would be put on trial for homosexuality. These are the first to face trial since police began arresting people on allegations of homosexuality in November. At least 16 more are known to be in detention, and Gambian human rights activists do not know if they are even still alive.  Read More

Middle East funds Gambia as EU cuts aid over human rights concerns

The European Union has withdrawn millions of euros of funding for Gambia due to its poor human rights record, and after Jammeh signed into law an act that would imprison homosexuals for life. The Muslim West African nation will now rely increasingly on donors from the Middle East for development projects. The shift in soft power is of concern to Western governments in a region where Islamist militancy in northern Nigeria and northern Mali is fuelling instability, diplomatic sources said.

"West Africa has a large, impressionable youth population that have no access to jobs. Their loyalty might be bought through aid, sometimes by those sympathetic to the Islamification of the region," said one diplomat. Read More

UNICEF releases its first official, public position on sexual orientation, gender identity and children

The 6-page position paper is available now: All children, irrespective of their actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity, have the right to a safe and healthy childhood that is free from discrimination. The same principle applies to all children irrespective of their parents sexual orientation or gender identity.

Both the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights make clear that human rights are universal. No person — child or adult — should suffer abuse, discrimination, exploitation, marginalization or violence of any kind for any reason, including on the basis of their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. Read More 

Reaching gay men: the next big test in HIV/AIDS prevention in China

In the last few decades medical advances have transformed AIDS from a death sentence into a chronic disease. It can be treated and controlled – provided, of course, that a person with the HIV virus is diagnosed. By far the fastest growing group of new cases in China is among male homosexuals, and it’s there that many health experts are concentrating their efforts to check the disease’s spread.

Government figures have revealed nearly half a million people are living with HIV and 25% of new infections are among gay men. For Wu Zunyou, director of the National Centre for Aids/STD Control and Prevention, the critical and most difficult task now to prevent or control the disease is reaching these men, in particular the students.  Read More 

Europe’s HIV response falls short in curbing the epidemic

Europe will miss its 2015 targets for curbing the spread of HIV, says the WHO, with an 80% increase in HIV transmission in 2013 compared with a decade earlier.  “Europe has not managed to reach the 2015 Millennium Development Goal target to halt and reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS, and time is running out. While we are facing emerging health threats, this reminds us that we cannot afford to drop our guard on HIV/AIDS,” says Zsuzsanna Jakab, WHO Regional Director for Europe.

“Why we have not seen any significant progress in reducing HIV infections during the last decade? Looking at our data, we clearly see that across Europe the populations most at risk of HIV infection are not reached effectively enough, particularly men who have sex with men,” explains ECDC Director Marc Sprenger. In the EU/EEA, sex between men is still the predominant mode of HIV transmission, which accounted for 42% of newly diagnosed HIV infections in 2013.  Read More