BRUSSELS, 25 January 2023 – Today, The European AIDS Treatment Group (EATG) launches the HIV & Mental Health Platform for Europe and Central Asia. This new online space is intended to foster collaboration and experience exchange across Europe and Central Asia in addressing the mental health needs of people living with and affected by HIV.
EATG has been prioritising mental health and HIV since early 2020. Previous work shone a light on mental health within HIV prevention, support, treatment, and care across Europe and Central Asia. In doing so, it expanded EATG’s engagement in HIV and mental health to a wider range of stakeholders.
The HIV & Mental Health Platform is the next step in this process. It will have three main aims:
- To foster collaboration and exchange of experiences, the sharing of good practice in providing mental health and psychosocial services to people living with and vulnerable to HIV, especially relative to community-based and lay or non-professional services.
- To promote the implementation of EATG’s recommendations on HIV and mental health.
- To support the development of the first European Conference on HIV and mental health -tentatively scheduled for early 2024.
The main features of this platform are the forum and resources sections. In the forum discussions will be initiated, facilitating exchange of experiences between community-led organisations representatives and professionals in the field. Resources and materials about HIV and mental health will be freely accessible through the relevant section.
The HIV & Mental Health Platform will be available in 11 languages: English, Russian, Italian, Spanish, French, Ukrainian, Croatian, Portuguese, Polish, German and Turkish.
The first main event following the launch of the HIV & Mental Health Platform will be a stakeholder webinar on 20 February 2023. This webinar will explore key ways to ensure a more effective continuum of care as people living with HIV move between community-based, primary, secondary, and tertiary levels of mental health systems. The resulting discussion is expected to further the process of clarifying a framework for mental health task sharing across the community, healthcare, and specialist levels in the HIV field, with a focus on underserved populations and Europe’s subregional differences.
How to access the platform
You will have to sign up/become a member to the platform. Registration and participation are free of charge.
For further information, please contact:
Anton Basenko anton.basenko@eatg.org
The HIV & Mental Health project has been developed by the EATG, and was made possible through a grant from Gilead Sciences Europe Ltd, Merck Sharp and Dohme, and ViiV Healthcare Europe Ltd. EATG acknowledges that the sponsors had no control or input into the structure or the content of the initiative.
Related News
-
WAD 2023 | Stigma-Free: We call for stigma-free integrated services –Video
-
Stigma-Free: video reporting from EACS 2023 ‘Empowering communities and clinicians for harm reduction and mental health’ session
-
World Mental Health Day: EATG launches campaign on intersectional stigma faced by people living with HIV and affected communities
Get involved
Are you living with HIV/AIDS? Are you part of a community affected by HIV/AIDS and co-infections? Do you work or volunteer in the field? Are you motivated by our cause and interested to support our work?
Subscribe
Stay in the loop and get all the important EATG updates in your inbox with the EATG newsletter. The HIV & co-infections bulletin is your source of handpicked news from the field arriving regularly to your inbox.