Our News
Camp Seaside - April 2007. Another very successful
Camp Seaside. Continuing the tradition.Well done everyone!
Source: The Australian AIDS Fund Inc
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World AIDS Day Special Appeal 2006
Is one gold coin too much to ask?
For more information, click
HERE. |
An Invitation - from "Straight
Arrows" in Melbourne.
The Straight Arrows agency is running its annual
retreat on July 6, a very special HIV-care event that
seeks to offer both comfort and support.
Please give it your support and encourage participation.
For more information, click
HERE.
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For updates, click on the following:
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An inspiring Letter from Cambodia
March, 2006
Our website has about one million visitors each year
and so we hear stories from all four corners of the
earth!
In our work with HIV and AIDS we have learned that
stigma and discrimination in fact are just as destructive
as HIV itself, worsening personal ordeals and exposing
the infected to social isolation and discrimination.
This, in turn, can cause many of the infected to become
frightened and to seek to hide their infection at
the very time when they need comfort, support and
medical treatment.And stigma and discrimination can
also be found in Australia too as well as anywhere
else. Indeed, the discrimination against the first
Australian child to be HIV infected via a blood transfusion...Eve
van Grafhorst... caused us to establish The Australian
AIDS Fund charity some 20 years ago to provide shelter
and support.
(You
can read her story in the Schools AIDS area of this
website).
Most recently we have been further inspired by a
teenage Australian's story, Chris Bowman, now living
in Cambodia.His whole family is quite extraordinary,
always willing to open their hearts to the hurting
or the discarded, which is why Chris now has some
13 Cambodian brothers and sisters, 5 of them from
AIDS households where their parents have died and
there was no-one to look after them. (Of these 5 one
was living by scrounging through rubbish, while her
younger sister, who she had not seen for 5 years,
lived on the Cambodia-Thailand border and collected
insects to sell to survive, two other sisters came
to us after their mother died and the only relative
was working as a prostitute to support her own family,
and the fifth came from a soldier and his wife who
have since died.)
Chris's father is a Health Advisor with World Relief
- Cambodia. Now 17, in grade 11 and the lead singer
of a band called Novice, Chris will be headed for
Australia in June to try his luck in the Australian
Idol auditions.We wish him well!
Click here to read his
story.
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The Australian AIDS Fund INc. in
Conjucnction with Botswana AIDS Melbourne(BAM) Proudly
presents:
VOICES AND IMAGES OF HOPE with Cantorion Cymreig VICTORIA
WELSH CHOIR. click
here to read more about it |
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An Australian Catholic agency in its World
AIDS Day message (today, December 1) warns commentators
against putting "a woman's face" on the AIDS pandemic simply
because more women are being infected, and challenges a Catholic
priest on the federal government's AIDS Advisory sub committee
to speak out in defence of condoms. |
Outlook 2004 - January, 2004
Australia
Our Camp Seaside respite camp initiative continues again this year in
Victoria as does the unfunded telephone advisory service and our promotion
of Schools AIDS Day, which is conducted by the Catholic Education Office
in Melbourne and which materially benefits the Melbourne Catholic AIDS
Ministry, which we've urged to widen its work.
The HIV benefit concert which we've been seeking for the past decade
will be staged by the Australian
Doctors' Orchestra in Melbourne in September this year.
We're also continuing our push for greater direct government funding
to people living with HIV/AIDS; more proportionate funding for the smaller
AIDS care agencies and mainstream media HIV/AIDS alerts so that these
vital awareness messages are not confined to the gay community alone.
Global
The Lemons and AIDS initiative will take centre stage this year as the
world looks to the next Interntional AIDS
Conference to be held in Bangkok, Thailand.
We'll also continue our drive to see children involved in the forefront
of national HIV/AIDS Awareness cmpaigns.
Papua New Guinea
The San Michel HIV/AIDS hospice, PNG's first, will also shortly be opened
and continue to receive our material
support.
Botswana, Uganda and Kenya will also reflect our
particular interest as we look to the needs especially of children and
young people in those lands.
Our website will also continue to remain a vital and continually
updated HIV/AIDS resource for all.
We'll value your ongoing support.
Brian Haill,
President,
The Australian AIDS Fund Inc
AIDS Information Services,
PO Box 1347, Frankston, Victoria, 3199, Australia
Email: bhail@bigpond.net.au
Can we beat AIDS?
As a lead up to this year's World AIDS Day on December 1, 2003, the
BBC News World Service, together with BBC News Interactive - http://www.bbcnews.com/aids
has been running a superb Global AIDS Debate inviting interaction from
all over the world and providing a host of experts including the UNAIDS
Chief Peter Piot and the President of Botswana to answer questions.
The Australian AIDS Fund Incorporated has been one of those contributors
salutes the BBC for its great effort, repeating what the UN Secretary-General,
Kofi Annan has called "the genocide of a generation"
is a marathon, not a sprint.
Participants were invited to offer their responses to the question:
"Can we beat AIDS?"
How Has HIV Hit You?
In its global outreach, the BBC AIDS Debate also invited people to
share their stories, asking the question:
"How has HIV hit you?"
The Australian AIDS Fund Incorporated was one of many who answered the
question.
The World Edition of BBC News is carrying a superb series on the biology
of AIDS covering the Hiv virus, Infection, Early Stages and as AIDS
Develops.
Global HIV infecting youth - 1 every 14 seconds
- October, 2003
U.N. State of World Population Report
To read, Click Here
July, 2003 News update
A Special 21st birthday! … and a warning. To read, Click
Here |
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Message From A Princess
To mark Eve's 21st birthday, her mother Gloria has released a treasured
letter she received from the Princess of Wales.
Lemons and AIDS
The work of the Melbourne - based LemonAIDS team is gathering global
interest and its reports on this its authorised website are eagerly
awaited and read in 8 languages.
Channel 9's 'A Current Affair'
Channel 9 recently featured The Australian AIDS Fund and its founder,
Brian Haill, in a special report on SARS and a doomsday report from
a London AIDS expert.
China....and India
The news from China is that our much awaited educational resource material
has finally reached its destination after some four months! The little
home-based group is doing well and extending its awareness efforts.
A valued medical colleague in Beijing is also in contact.
In our efforts to support the two young children in India's Kerala
State who are being denied a place in schol because of their HIV infection,
we've now won the support f the Nkosi Johnson Foundation in South Africa.
Your support would also be valued!
Camp Seaside, 2003
Once again, Camp Seaside won special regard for itself when the
3 day event was recently staged on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula.
It's a vital program for infected/affected families and is deserving
of every support. The March camp reflected a great deal of credit
on its organisers. Our special thanks to them! |
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| The .pdf files below require Adobe Acrobat
Reader to view |
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News Update - April, 2003
Special HIV Concert for Melbourne
The Board of The Australian AIDS Fund Inc is pleased to advise its
Australian website visitors that its 10 year - long lobbying efforts
have resulted in the Australian Doctors Orchestra agreeing to stage
its first ever benefit concert to help people living with HIV/AIDS,
to be held in Melbourne later next year.
This famed orchestra has generously assisted a number of worthy causes
over the years.
A significant sum is expected as a result of the ADO's gesture as well
as from supporting sponsors and we've been assured that all of the money
will be directed to those who'll be depending on it.
The ok for the concert was flashed to AAFI President, Brian Haill,
as follows:
To: Brian Haill
Subject: The Australian AIDS Fund Inc
Date: March 14,2003
Dear Brian,
"You have already been pencilled in for Melbourne 2004 Concert....."
Cheers,
MJ Pohl
(Founder/President)
We encourage all those approached to buy tickets, to give this concert
their every support.
China
We're still keeping tabs on the small community we've
found supporting each other in a home care setting in southern China.
Speaking in tongues!!
The new website pages devoted to Lemons and AIDS can now
be translated into 8 languages!
Women and AIDS
Few realise the plight of the world's HIV infected women..and
what that means to everyone else. The need for a gender-based response
is highlighted on the Introductory page
in the Lemons and AIDS website area.
It needs to be read.
Hollywood stars
Our work has attracted American interest and several Hollywood
stars are indicating some gifts may be on the way!
Our website visitors in Belgium
Have advised that they've not only heard about our Eve
van Grafhorst, but they also treasure an imported video about her to
strengthen their understanding of HIV and tolerance.
China
We've also increased our links/support for a San Michel
style community providing home care in southern China, and they've been
promised technical support and training. Resource material has also
been supplied.
Schools AIDS Day 2003
The new Director of Melbourne's Catholic Education Office,
Ms Susan Pascoe, has confirmed that this awareness initiative of ours
will go ahead again
this year. Please give it your fullest support. Schools outside Victoria,
which are also
invited to participate can email their interest to Brian Haill at bhaill@bigpond.net.au
The George Pell biography
It's worth a read. It contains references to our supported
accommodation services and the support we also provided to the Archbishop
last year.
The Spinney Press
This is an excellent publisher of resources covering social
issues for use by Australian secondary school students. It's latest
work, entitled HIV/AIDS will be out soon and will include material from
the Australian AIDS Fund Inc.
December 3, 2002
Victoria - Camp Seaside
The November 2002 Camp Seaside was reported to have been
one of the best ever and was excellently managed by the Straight Arrows
agency which is to be congratulated for the considerable effort put
into it. We also gratefully acknowledge the invaluable support of Rotary
for this project.
At this point, the new Board of the Australian AIDS Fund
is planning to stage two Camp Seaside programs in 2003 to build on their
continuing success and undoubted need. The March 2003 Camp is already
confirmed.
| The .pdf files below require Adobe Acrobat
Reader to view |
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August, 2002
Contrary to the written advice sent to some agencies and
organisations in recent times and brought to our attention, The Australian
AIDS Fund Inc has most certainly not "ceased operations" and
nor is it "ceasing operations".
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