Ending The HIV Stigma

UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon uses the US decision to end the HIV travel ban as a pivot to push for those few left with stigmatizing policies to step up:

Ban has made the lifting of stigma and discrimination connected with AIDS a personal mission, first calling on countries to lift their travel restrictions in 2008 at a UN meeting on the disease. The travel restrictions "should fill us all with shame," Ban told a global AIDS conference in August 2008.

According to UNAIDS, Ban's home country of South Korea is "in the last stages of removing travel restrictions," while China and Ukraine are among countries considering following suit. "Placing travel restrictions on people living with HIV has no public health justification. It is also a violation of human rights," said UNAIDS executive director Michel Sidibe.

One other great thing for the US: international HIV and AIDS conferences will now be able to take place stateside for the first time in almost two decades.

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