{"id":11486,"date":"2019-12-03T16:49:46","date_gmt":"2019-12-04T00:49:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/?p=11486"},"modified":"2019-12-03T16:49:46","modified_gmt":"2019-12-04T00:49:46","slug":"hivalliance-partners-with-abbys-house-to-combat-misinformation-about-hiv-and-treatment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/hivalliance-partners-with-abbys-house-to-combat-misinformation-about-hiv-and-treatment\/","title":{"rendered":"HIVAlliance partners with Abby\u2019s House to combat misinformation about HIV and treatment."},"content":{"rendered":"

Sage Kiernan-Sherrow<\/strong>\u00a0 |\u00a0 News Editor<\/span><\/p>\n

HIV has a long history of stigmatization throughout the nation. Partnering with Abby\u2019s House on campus, HIVAlliance came to Western Wednesday, Nov. 20, \u201cto discuss <\/span>the current status of HIV in Oregon, how HIV is spread and not spread, and ways to prevent HIV, including PrEP,\u201d according to Keith Mathews, a Western Alumni and current PrEP Coordinator for the Northern Region of Oregon.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to HIVAlliance\u2019s website, hivalliance.org, PrEP stands for Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis, \u201ca medication taken daily that can be used to reduce the likelihood of HIV infection by preventing the virus from taking hold and spreading throughout the body,\u201d which, \u201ccan reduce the risk of sexually acquired HIV by more than 90% and can reduce the risk of HIV among people who inject drugs by more than 70%.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

HIVAlliance helps to educate the public about PrEP, as well as helping PrEP users navigate insurance, providers and financial support services. Additionally, HIVAlliance operates under a harm reduction philosophy which \u201cseeks to empower individuals, remove barriers to accessing the support that they need, and offer pragmatic approaches to risk reduction in a non-judgmental\/non-coercive way, that is compassionate and accepting of any positive change,\u201d according to hivalliance.org.<\/span><\/p>\n

Prior to the presentation, Mathews reached out to Abby\u2019s House himself, saying that, \u201cI knew their missions overlapped with our mission at HIVAlliance to educate about HIV and prevention. In my four years at WOU I heard very little about HIV apart from a few events highlighting awareness so I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity to start that conversation at WOU.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He added that, \u201cdespite the perception of lessened stigma around HIV, there is still a lot of misinformation around HIV which continues the stigma to this day.\u00a0 The best way to receive correct information is to find medically accurate and correct information on HIV and talk to people, especially sexual partners, about HIV status and testing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Currently, there are various organizations which offer STI and HIV testing, including Western\u2019s\u00a0 own Student Health and Counseling Center. Polk County Public Health, Marion County Health and Human Services, HIVAlliance and Planned Parenthood all offer testing within the community.<\/span><\/p>\n

For more information, visit hivalliance.org<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contact the author at howlnews@wou.edu<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sage Kiernan-Sherrow\u00a0 |\u00a0 News Editor HIV has a long history of stigmatization throughout the nation. Partnering with Abby\u2019s House on campus, HIVAlliance came to Western Wednesday, Nov. 20, \u201cto discuss the current status of HIV in Oregon, how HIV is spread and not spread, and ways to prevent HIV, including PrEP,\u201d according to Keith Mathews, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1094,"featured_media":10024,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"modified_by":"The Western Howl","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1094"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11486"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11486\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}