An Update from Chuck on the Minnesota Statewide Plan to End HIV — May 29, 2019

Chuck Peterson

Chuck Peterson, executive director of Clare Housing, delivered these remarks at the Minnesota Department of Health’s update on the Statewide Plan to End HIV, now entitled END HIV MN at the Minnesota State Capitol on May 29th, 2019. Chuck is one of the committee members responsible for generating the plan.

We are at a critical crossroad in our continued fight against HIV. Access to care and treatment as prevention provides us with a unique moment in time to end an epidemic which has ravaged our community for over three decades.

Since the beginning, the fight against HIV has always been more than the search for a cure.

It’s been a battle for human dignity.

A battle to demonstrate that each life, regardless of race, sexual orientation, gender identity, nation of origin, or religion, has inherent value.

And yet today, HIV continues to take the largest toll on our most marginalized communities.

From gay men and transgender women to people who inject drugs and people of color – those who are most often shut out of our communities and are also the most vulnerable to a wide range of health challenges, including HIV.

As a gay man who lived through the heart of the AIDS crisis, I never would have guessed that nearly 30 years later stigma, barriers to affordable housing and access to quality healthcare would still exist, and, be a primary driver to increased HIV infections in our own backyard and around the world.

This is why we are here today. To give voice to those right here in our own community living with HIV who are not receiving proper nutrition, medical care, housing supports or the medications necessary to fight the virus.

I am proud to continue serving on the MN HIV Strategy Advisory Board. Our work will continue until we see the end of HIV in Minnesota. To achieve this goal, End HIV MN has the following goals …

• Increase the percentage of Minnesotans living with HIV who know their HIV status to at least 90% by 2025. I’m proud to say that we have already achieved this milestone!
• Increase the percentage of Minnesotans diagnosed with HIV who are retained in care to at least 90% by 2025. We have some work to do here, as we currently estimate 73% of individuals living with HIV are retained in care.
• Of individuals retained in care, we must increase the percentage of individuals who are virally suppressed to at least 90% by 2025. We are so close – our most recent data indicates that 88% of individuals retained in care have achieved viral suppression.
• And finally, when we achieve these three goals we will be on track to reduce the annual number of new HIV infections by at least 25% by 2025, and at least 75% by 2035. This means by 2035, we would see only 75 new infections.

Now I speak to you, community members and leaders. We can’t do this work in isolation and it is critical that we come together to collaborate in ways we never thought possible.

We truly need your help to end HIV in Minnesota … to help build awareness and dismantle barriers to identifying HIV risk and status. We need you to talk openly about HIV in your community to raise awareness of HIV and promote testing, treatment, and prevention.

And finally, we need you to help us make connections between HIV and other issues that may be prevalent in your community, such as opioid usage, tuberculosis, or homelessness.

Now is the time to work in partnership – not isolation. We need to no longer work in silos but collaboratively with the shared goal of ending HIV.

Your investment in END HIV MN will …

• Prevent new HIV infections
• Give access to critical HIV related prevention, care and treatment, for all people
• Reduce health disparities
• Ensure safe, affordable, and stable housing for all people living with HIV
• And, most importantly, together, we will end this epidemic.

Thank you.

You can watch the entire program here, including Chuck’s remarks towards the end of the program: