The educational initiative Youth Against AIDS (YAA) is enforcing the role of the youth in the fight against HIV/AIDS. As official partner of this year’s World AIDS Conference, 300 youth activists will represent their generation’s interests in summer in Amsterdam. The campaign plays around with common misperceptions and mobilizes youths to volunteer.
Youth against AIDS captures common misperceptions won HIV and AIDS. The mostawarded youth-led awareness campaign remains true to its approach: Sex education at eye level and by direct speech.
- “AIDS is so 1980.“
- “Nobody dies of AIDS.“
- “AIDS is over.“
- “Only bad people get AIDS.“
- “Only poor people get AIDS.“
Of course, none of these widespread perceptions is true. It follows: “Really? Young people around the world get infected every day. We can change that. Become active now. Apply for a scholarship to join us at the World AIDS Conference in Amsterdam.“
“It is not enough to only talk about emphasizing the role of the youth – we have to make our generation act so that we can set an end to HIV/AIDS. It is our generation to decide if it will be successful. Therefore, it is important that our voices are heard – we will fight for that in Amsterdam”, says Daniel Nagel, Chairman of the board of Youth against AIDS.
For many teenagers, AIDS is not a relevant topic anymore, but the numbers still are alarming: just in 2016, more than 1.8 million people got infected with the life-threatening virus. One million people died in the same year. Numbers are rising, even in high developed countries.
The campaign reechoes out to people who want to make a change to that. As an official partner of the World AIDS conference, YAA will bring more than 300 young people from all continents to AIDS2018 and emphasizes that it is the young generation who can end HIV. To reach young people all over the world the campaign will be advanced till summer.
To finance the project YAA and GoFundMe start a worldwide crowdfunding campaign at the 14th March and by that enable a worldwide engagement against HIV/AIDS.
With pre-events on five continents, seven countries and eight cities, the educational initiative makes their position clear: We can end AIDS. Worldwide, the initiative gives young people the chance to be a part of the change. The whole amount goes directly to the necessary preventative work. Each engaged young person on this world should have the possibility to involve himself and communicate his needs – regardless of his origin or social status.
YAA-pre-events:
- 14th March New York
- 5th April Berlin
- 12th April Mumbai
- 23rd April Geneva
- 3rd May Sao Paulo
- 16th May Johannesburg
- 24th May Warsaw
- 28th June Hong Kong
- 22nd June San Francisco
All the information about the recent campaign: https://youth-against-aids.org
Youth Against AIDS at GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/youthagainstaids
Youth Against AIDS is a youth-led organization that provides sexual education in schools and youth facilities all over Europe and beyond. YAA is the largest, most awarded youthled awareness campaign. They talk about sexuality, HIV, and other STDs in their workshops. YAA provides a space for young people where they can express any lack of knowledge without being ashamed. YAA uses a peer-to-peer approach allowing them to have dialogues at eye level. Furthermore, they do targeted publicity work to help cultivate an educated and diverse society. Their goal is a community in which sexuality never leads to exclusion, fear or stigma. Their motto: Do what you want. Do it with love, respect and condoms.