This is especially relevant to Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union, where people under 30 form the bulk of HIV carriers. Most of those infected take drugs intravenously.
About twenty young delegates attended the Bangkok conference. They took part in all sideline conferences, devoted to medical as well as social aspects of the AIDS epidemic, delivered speeches, and took an active part in campaigns to protect the rights of HIV patients.
"Civil society cannot be built without our involvement; our voices must be heard," points out Anna, a 24-year-old activist representing a regional Russian movement against HIV/AIDS. She provides consulting services to HIV-positive expectant mothers, advising them on how to prevent the virus from spreading to the child during delivery.
"This conference gave us a huge energy boost," notes Igor Pchelin, a high-profile Russian campaigner, who edits a nationwide magazine on HIV/AIDS, Shagi (or Steps). He says he is now trying to engage virus carriers all across Russia into his anti-AIDS efforts and that more and more young people join in.
"We need to feel the support and solidarity and to help one another," says Alexander, 24, a former drug addict from Irkutsk, in eastern Siberia. He is one of those who have joined Pchelin's movement. "All of us needed that conference. [There] we could feel unity with HIV-positive people from other countries; we had opportunities to share experience in fighting HIV/AIDS with guys from Europe and the States."
Konstantin Lezhentsev, a young doctor, one of the former Soviet Union's leading experts on methods to reduce risks for intravenous drug addicts, is now leading an international development program to reduce the risk of infection. He is credited with having pushed Ukrainian authorities into bringing down anti-retroviral drug prices. Lezhentsev is one of the activists campaigning for equal access to treatment for all those in need. "Access for All" was precisely the slogan of the 15th International Conference on HIV/AIDS. Anti-retroviral drugs still remain beyond reach for most of Russia's HIV sufferers, with the average price for a year-long course being as high as $10,000.
Dmitri Samoilov, representing the Russian Association of People Living with HIV/AIDS, says that anti-retroviral therapies are often inaccessible to drug addicts, who form a greater part of those in need of such therapies. Some doctors just refuse to provide such therapies to drug addicts, he explains.
"I don't feel an outcast any more," "I've made a lot of friends in various countries," "We need to come together and continue advancing initiatives,"-these are phrases one can hear from the Bangkok conference's younger participants. "We are also pinning hopes on politicians, who must become more attentive to our needs," Anna, one of our interviewees, emphasizes.
