City Hall is full of small electric candles right now, held by marchers in Portland’s 21st Annual World AIDS Day commemoration. Cascade AIDS Project Executive Director Michael Kaplan’s short speech to the hundred-odd crowd that marched across downtown to City Hall was refreshingly devoid of backslapping. “After 21 years, why aren’t we using federal funds for needle exchange? After 21 years, why aren’t we talking about comprehensive sex education? Why are there gay kids in schools still thinking they’re the only ones?” Kaplan told the City Hall crowd, to applause.
Good questions to be asking. As attention focuses on the global AIDS crisis, this year’s World AIDS Day campaign is focusing here in the U.S., where someone is infected with HIV every nine and a half minutes. In a fantastic article in the NYT last week, my favorite journalist Tina Rosenberg argued that the time for federally-funded needle exchange programs is now: “Only a government can do needle exchange on a wide scale. This is what is needed to reduce H.I.V. rates — not just for drug users, but for us all.”
The only group I know of running needle exchange locally is Outside In, the beneficiaries of this year’s Mercury charity auction that kicks off tomorrow.
More photos from the City Hall rally under the cut.
- Marchers pouring into City Hall at 5:15 PM
- The woman on the left had never been to City Hall in her 50+ years as a Portlander
- Mayor Adams poses with HIV positive marchers
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