Where has all the prevention activism gone?

Hola companeros. This is my first blog of the conference, so I thought I'd open with a question. Not my question though...this one actually came from UNAIDS chief, Peter Piot during his keynote at the MSM pre-conference. In his remarks, Piot urged the audience not to forget HIV prevention activism, reminding us that it was the gay community in the 80s that invented it.

So what do you think folks? Has prevention activism been waning? Does it need a revival?

In my day job as a sexuality education advocate, I can report that in the US prevention advocacy around sexuality and HIV education is certainly alive and well. Advocacy is slightly different from activism, but the activism still pops up in local stories about students pinning condoms to their shirts in schools that teach abstinence-only-until-marriage programs or parents mounting a honk-and-wave campaign for responsible sex ed.

I should also give a hat tip here to CHAMP, who has been carrying the banner of prevention activism and prevention justice since it's inception.

On the other hand, I can't remember seeing anything on the scale of the infamous 1991 Treatment Action Group (TAG) demonstration that included covering Sen. Jesse Helms' house in a giant condom that read "Helms is deadlier than a virus" in a long time.

I also think Piot's reference to activism of the past was probably specific to US and British activism, but I wonder if his comment on the state of activism today is relevant to the global south as well?

To those who live or work in the global south - what do you think? Are there HIV-prevention activism efforts happening as we speak in your country that we should know about and be supporting? Or do you think activism in you area is mostly confined to treatment and care issues?

Looking forward to the responses and more blogging.