In hopes of fighting high HIV infection rates in the Latinx community, Cal State Long Beach’s Salud a la Vida will host its second annual National Latinx AIDS Awareness Day Thursday.
CSULB’s Center for Latino Community Health, along with Bienestar Human Services, has partnered up with Salud a la Vida to help put together this event, which will be held from 2 – 3 p.m. in Peterson Hall 2 room 203.
Salud a la Vida is funded by the CLCH, the National Council of La Raza and Bienestar Human Services. Salud a la Vida is a project aimed to establish a university-community partnership and reduce HIV risks as well as alcohol and substance abuse among the Long Beach Latinx community.
NLAAD was organized in hopes of curbing the spread of HIV and slowing down transmission rates among the Latinx community.
The event will feature information booths addressing how to practice safe sex and how to form and maintain healthy relationships. There will also be information on sexually transmitted disease testing resources.
Attendees will also hear first-hand accounts and testimonials from Latinx youth and HIV advocates. However, the names of the panelists cannot be disclosed due to confidentiality reasons.
Latinx and people of color are disproportionately affected by HIV, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. The CDC said in a 2013 report that one in five HIV infections in the United States are among Latinx people.
Latinx people represent 17 percent of the United States population, but they make up 23 percent of new HIV diagnoses – and out of those diagnosed with HIV, 40 percent were young adults between 20 and 29 years old, according to a 2016 CDC report.
Diana Aguirre, a graduate research assistant at the CLCH, explained that the need for events like NLAAD was brought to attention by a group of young Latinx participating in a needs-assessment.
She said the group concluded that a lack of open sexual education and discussion are the biggest barriers to HIV prevention in the Latinx community.
“We can’t talk about sex in my family, they’re too traditional,” junior human development major Lizbeth Mariano said.
Jenni Lopez, a junior psychology major, agreed, saying her mom never tried talking with her about sex or AIDS.
“We wanted to create this opportunity to get a conversation going and defeat HIV/AIDS by talking about it and removing the stigma associated with HIV infection,” Aguirre said. “Therefore, with CSULB being a hispanic serving institute, talking about this issue, creating awareness and providing health promotion and preventative services should be a priority on our campus.”
NLAAD is only one of many strategies that the Salud a la Vida project has brought to CSULB and the Long Beach Community in order to promote healthy lifestyle behaviors and safer sex practices, as well to promote partner communications skills, Aguirre said.
Resources offered on campus by Salud a la Vida and Bienestar include free and confidential testing with the Bienestar HIV Testing Van that will be on campus from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. on Thursday.
NLAAD at CSULB is part of a nationwide awareness day that is actually on Saturday, but will but Thursday’s celebration is to accommodate student’s schedules.