Fantastic World AIDS Day Fundraiser for GHT!

posted: 19/10/2011

We’re delighted to announce that the wonderful people at TheGayVillageOnline.com have nominated George House Trust as their charity for this year’s World AIDS Day fundraiser.  it's a Tooty Booty competition, with the grand final being held on the 2nd December at Cruz 101.

In conjunction with Poptastic and Hot Village Magazine, the competition aims to discover the best behind in the village!

Village bars and clubs will all nominate a member of staff from their teams to take part and you get to vote for the winner by text. All cash raised from voting and £1 of each entry purchased for the grand final will go to supporting our vital work here at George House Trust.

For more information visit the Tooty Booty webpage They also have Facebook page, so please show them your support!

Icon Bar are organising a very special Deal or No Deal style night at their bar on Friday 2nd December, where George House Trust have been invited to attempt to ‘beat the banker’ to raise money for our charity.

The evening starts from 8.30 p.m. and GHT would love to see as many of our supporters there as possible, to cheer us on! For details of the venue, visit their website

Poptastic have organised their Annual Big Red Ball on Tuesday 29th November 2011, which will be raising money for George House Trust for World AIDS Day.

Entry to the event at Club Alterego is only £3 before midnight. For more information, you can visit Poptastic’s website

The Tooty Booty, Deal or No Deal and the Big Red Ball event are one of many activities being promoted as part of TheGayVillageOnline.com’s Raising4Red campaign, which encourages local businesses to support  HIV related charities in Greater Manchester, over the World AIDS Day period. They have set a target of raising £10,000 and George House Trust is one of the charities that will benefit.

If you’d like to get involved or want to find out more, you can visit their website
or join their Facebook page

George House Trust’s is extremely grateful for this amazing support.
 

World AIDS Day, 2011

posted: 23/09/2011

World AIDS Day is marked on the 1st December all over the World – raising awareness and raising money for people living with HIV and AIDS. The noise that we make about HIV and AIDS on this international day is vitally important, as it challenges stigma and discrimination too.

How can you get involved?

Hold a fundraiser

You may choose to fundraise at your workplace or with a local community group.
As a basic fundraising package, this year George House Trust can provide you with Red Ribbons, Collecting tins and HIV awareness leaflets and postcards
If you are interested in fundraising, then contact us with a rough idea of how many people you want to fundraise with.

Sell our red ribbons in your shop or café

If you would be interested in selling red ribbons in aid of GHT, we can provide you with a counter display box and collecting tin. Contact us to arrange.

Volunteer!

Every year - we’re out on the streets selling red ribbons in Manchester city centre with our team of volunteers. If you are interested in joining us on the streets of Manchester, then get in touch.

Attend the Candlelit Vigil

Also in December we organise a candlelit vigil in Sackville Park / Gardens in Central Manchester which is an opportunity to remember those people we have lost to HIV. Any proceeds from the Vigil go to organisations supporting local people living with HIV.

Behind Bars – HIV Prosecution Harm

posted: 09/12/2010

Behind Bars is a collection of interviews exposing how criminal laws on HIV transmission are affecting people’s working and private lives, all around the world.

Personal Prosecution Tales
The personal stories illustrate the dilemmas faced by doctors, lawyers, researchers and advocates. They include the stories of

• a doctor who was forced to aid a police investigation against her ethical principles,
• a woman living with HIV who prosecuted her former partner, and
• a lawyer who advocated in an HIV transmission case.

There is little research showing precisely what effect HIV prosecutions have. But prosecutions further marginalise people already vulnerable to HIV infection, including women, men who have sex with men, sex workers and people who use drugs. Legislation and legal practice is different in every country around the world, and we need to learn more about the effect of using criminal law on HIV in each country. By fuelling stigma, prosecutions undermine the HIV efforts to prevent, treat and care.

World of Prosecutions
From the UK to the USA, Mali to Mozambique, Azerbaijan to Australia, criminal laws are increasingly being used to prosecute HIV transmission or exposure. But, as the interviews reveal, criminal law is a blunt instrument for HIV prevention.

More denial, secrecy and fear
Behind Bars show how a simplistic ‘law-and-order’ response to HIV intensifies a climate of denial, secrecy and fear and provides a fertile breeding ground for the spread of HIV.

Paying the prosecutions price
Prosecuting wilful transmission of HIV is proving a costly intervention - in terms of time and money spent on investigating individuals’ private lives and determining the burden of proof – and seems to have had limited impact on HIV prevention.
 

Contributor Jan Albert, Professor of Infectious Diseases at the Karolinska Institute Sweden, says:
“Since I’ve been an expert witness in court trials, my personal opinion regarding people living with the virus has changed. In my experience the accused are seldom ‘criminals’. There are many reasons for neglecting to inform sexual partners about HIV status, including denial. None, or very few, have had the intent to transmit HIV, which is how these acts often are described by the media. There will be more and more HIV infected people living in Sweden, and the rest of the world. Do we want to turn a proportion of our population into potential criminals every time they have sex?”

Kevin Osborne, Senior HIV Advisor for IPPF, said:
“These stories show that criminalisng the transmission of HIV is actually undermining our efforts to prevent the spread of HIV. Fear of prosecution deters people from coming forward for testing and counselling; policing the bedroom effectively drives the problem underground.”

Video campaign
The Behind Bars videos and interviews can be found at International Planned Parenthood Federation. The short campaign video highlights the impact of prosecutions. The film is available on YouTube and on the IPPF website.

The video is two-minutes long, stylised and artistic, showing the humanness of sex, of relationships and of HIV. The people in the film share their own, diverse stories (they are not professional actors), and many are living with HIV. It builds on the Declaration of Sexual Rights and purposefully focuses on sex – irrespective of how, where, with whom and why people have sex.

Football Club raises money for George House Trust

posted: 09/12/2010

George House Trust would like to say a big thank you to the Albaroni Football Club, who's team raised funds and awareness about HIV, as part of World AIDS Day 2010.

The young players wore red ribbons and heard a talk about HIV as well as collecting funds to support Geroge House Trust's work.

Lancashire World AIDS Day

posted: 24/11/2010

World AIDS Day events in Preston and central Lancashire are

• Friday 26th November 2010

9pm til late - Red Ribbon Cabaret at
53 Degrees @ UCLAN - University of Central Lanchashire, Preston 
The annual evening of entertainment to raise funds for local HIV Charities
Tickets £10-12 on the door
 

• Wednesday 1st December 2010

5pm - 7pm 

Awareness Raising, Live Performances and Information Sharing

at Harris Library, Preston

at 7:00pm Light refreshments, then at 7.30pm candlelit procession from the Harris Library to St Johns Minster Church

at 7.45pm in St Johns Minster Church, a multi faith service of remembrance and celebration
Finishing at 8.30pm
 

• Ending with a closing party at The Hangout Bar (behind The Bears Paw pub on Church St).
   

More information

on these events or how you, or your organisation can support World AIDS Day 2010, please email or phone Peter Channon, Lancashire HIV Services Coordinator, 01772 253 732

The HIV Service for Central Lancashire is: CLASS - helpline 01772 825 684