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Jamaican Kerrel Mckay – the global voice of youth at the International AIDS conference

By Indi Mclymont-Lafayette, Panos Caribbean

Toronto, 17 August 2006 (Panos). Twenty-three year old Jamaican, Kerrel McKay, spoke passionately Thursday on behalf of young people around the world affected and infected by HIV. He spoke at the fourth plenary session of the XVI International Conference on HIV/AIDS being held in Toronto, Canada.

Addressing a significant portion of the 24,000 persons attending the international conference, McKay called for an end to discrimination, and greater capacity building of the youth to fight the disease.

“To have a future we need to secure our youth,” said McKay. “We need quality sex education and wider dissemination of information in schools, churches and youth groups. We need information on contraceptives and life skills. We need youth friendly health care centres and a stronger platform to air our views.”

McKay was speaking on behalf of the young people attending the conference. There are 12 million young people (ages 15-24) and 3 million children who live with HIV/AIDS. The majority of new HIV infections are among young people. Six thousand young people and almost 2,000 children become infected everyday.

“We are young and we want to play our part with your help…. There is a need to build the skills of young people so that they can do more in the fight against HIV,” she said while commending the organisers of the Global Aids conference for significantly increasing the number of young people who were able to attend this year’s conference.

McKay also stressed the need for community, educational and other support structures in fighting against discrimination and stigma.

“In my hometown, as in many places around the world, there are kids whose parents are infected that are still being discriminated against by teachers, students and even their own family members. It is a cause for concern,” said McKay, whose father died as a result of AIDS. “There is still a high sense of stigma and discrimination faced by youngsters who try to access condoms and other services…We have to learn to be more supportive and to move past that,” she said.

McKay shared how she learnt at nine years old that her dad was HIV positive and how she took care of him until his death several years later. After his death, she started a support group for young people infected and affected by HIV in her home parish of Portland. A trained teacher, McKay now works with the Ministry of Health in Jamaica as an outreach officer.

An estimated 330,000 adults and children live with HIV in the Caribbean and in 2005, 27,000 persons died as a result of AIDS. There were an estimated 30,000 new infections in the region the same year.

Young women are at a higher risk of becoming infected than their male counterparts. In Trinidad and Tobago for instance, HIV infection levels are six times higher among 15-19 year old females than among males of the same age (UNAIDS, 2006). In Jamaica, teenaged girls (15-19) are two and a half times more likely to be infected than boys the same age. The large number of teens at risk of infection across the Caribbean is linked to a widely practiced culture of younger women establishing relationships with older men who due to their age and experiences are more likely to be infected.

After her speech McKay was optimistic about the issues voiced.

“Hopefully we (young people) will be taken seriously. I hope our views will be heard and also acted upon,” she said.