[Viva] Fwd: Thank You

Tue Nov 27 11:52:01 PST 2012

HI JESSICA AND DELORES

OOps I wanted to say hi in a big, welcoming way but didn't realize I'd hit the caps lock key.

I love that your first action is to spread the word and ask where we think you should focus - what a wonderful thing to do. Thank you.

Like Margarite, i would like to see attention paid to universal access to medication however that happens, access to generic drugs certainly helps as what we, long-term survivors, are taking is certainly not available except where funding is available. The health of the women in every country should be a priority - remember the old adage - women and children first! This may include women lobbying, or rather in polite countries like Canada, encouraging, governments to ensure that care is first made available to women and children. This is not the situation in many African countries, and I dare say parts of North America.

Secondly, female controlled methods of protection and prevention. This is more than microbicides. For example, we have many sizes of women, many twists and turns in our inner bodies (as well as our outer ones) and a single female condom.  What's that about? I want to see large, larger and largest like in male condoms. I don't care about the colours, but flavours might help!

And finally, although I know Jessica's on it, the ridiculous situation around criminalization needs to be addressed.  I think there is room to network with our sistas in the sex trade as well as transgendered women, gals who are probably very concerned about their social well-being, all the time.

Sending love and strength to you both.  -peg

Peggy Frank
Victoria,  BC 
Canada V8R 1L9

www.positivelyafrica.org

She who finds the path - the right path - does so for herself; and when she goes astray she creates her own loss and pain; and no one who carries a burden bears another's load.  Taken from - "He who finds the right path does so for himself; and he who goes astray does so to his own loss; and no one who carries a burden bears another man's load."  Al-Qur'an 17:15

On 2012-11-27, at 10:48 AM, Margarite Sanchez wrote:

> Hi Jessica and Deloris,
> 
> Congratulations to both of you. Way to go!
> Thank you for emailing us.....I am happy to hear from you and I appreciate being informed as things come up.
> 
> I want you to know that I will be forwarding your emails on to ViVA, a community of HIV+ women in British Columbia with over 60 members at the present time. I think it is important for small grassroots groups like ours to know that there is a big international grassroots group doing the same kind of work. Lately many ViVA women have been writing in support of Bill C-398, which would provide affordable generic drugs to resource limited countries. This is an important issue that ICWNA could also support.
> 
> Here is to a strong community of poz women <982.gif><982.gif> clink! clink!
> All the best,
> Margarite
>  
> 
> On Mon, Nov 26, 2012 at 3:41 PM, ICW NA <icwnacontact at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello ICW North America Members,
> 
>  
> We hope that you are doing well? We just wanted to take a minute and thank you formally for your support in electing us as your ICW North American representatives on the International Steering Committee. Thank you for believing in us!
> 
>  
> While in this position we want to focus on the following for our region:
> 
>  
> 1.     Building and strengthening our regional membership
> 
> 2.     Advocating for our regional issues at the global forum
> 
> 3.     Sharing global information with our membership so that we can better understand and support other ICW regions with their issues
> 
> 4.     Creating and maintaining better channels of communication between our membership
> 
>  
> We’re not exactly sure how this will be done, but we have some ideas.
> 
>  
> In order to do this we need to know what you think are the main advocacy issues that we need to focus on in our region. We are going to send out a very short survey monkey so you can fill it out.
> 
>  
> As far as ICW NA is concerned feel free to be as involved as you want. If you got a skill we can use it. Since we have no money, fundraising would be a great place to start. But of course there are many ways that we can work together to be agents of change in the HIV movement. Here are some areas that you could be involved:
> 
>  
> 1.     Writing articles for a newsletter
> 
> 2.     Reviewing policy and documents about women living with HIV
> 
> 3.     Sitting on boards, working groups and committees as an ICW representative
> 
> 4.     Starting ICW NA social support groups in your community to talk about positive women’s issues home and abroad
> 
> 5.     Writing grants for ICW
> 
> 6.     Participating at regional conferences and forums as an ICW representative
> 
>  
> There are probably many more ways that you could be part of this, it is up to you. All we ask is that is you are ever speaking on behalf of ICW or if you mention your involvement on a panel or workshop please send us a quick email so we can start to map where we are doing work in the region.
> 
>  
> If you have any questions or concerns don’t hesitate to contact us at icwnacontact at gmail.com
> 
>  
> We look forward to working with you.
> 
>  
> Warmly,
> 
> Jessica Whitbread and Deloris Dockrey 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
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> Viva at lists.resist.ca
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