Local researcher writes about International Programmes
in response to a global pandemic

Reviewed by Michael Nunn

Local contribution to global debate
Your reviewer makes no apology for writing about this important and well-written book from local academic and writer Sue Holden. I have already expressed concerns about the lack of debate in this otherwise enlightened community on this important issue and was of course delighted last December to note the achievement of a Lancaster contribution to this international issue.

Ironically, another illness which affects the immune system has seriously curtailed my journalism work over the last six months. Usually I would abandon a review as being no longer newsworthy, but a subject with such global, political, economic and humanitarian relevance as this simply cannot – must not - be ignored.

Proposals for responding to the Challenge of HIV/AIDS
Holden is obviously aware of this need, and her work focuses on developmental, care and support initiatives for combating the pandemic. Whilst it is clearly not for the general lay reader, it is a milestone contribution to the fight against HIV/AIDS on an international level. She describes and evaluates working methods and models for multinational development agency work – that is, co-ordinated, grass-roots ways of handling this tragedy by such bodies.

One response in a wide range of complex issues
The book pursues a different angle on the HIV/AIDS debate from the usual aspects we see reported generally in the media, such as:

• Drug cartels maintaining strangleholds on vital retroviral drugs supplies for developing countries, particularly in Africa;

• No consensus as international talks falter on global political initiatives for tackling HIV/AIDS

• The collapse in the momentum of the British government's national campaigns against HIV/AIDS;

• Huge rises in sexually-transmitted diseases in the UK, particularly in the North West;

• Emergence of high rates of infection in ‘new' areas, such as Russia and the former USSR, China etc.

• The perpetuation of prejudice and myths about HIV/AIDS – ‘gay plague', ‘catch it from loo seats' etc

Holden's book ploughs another furrow in a specialised field which is just as important and relevant as the concerns noted above in the wide-ranging HIV/AIDS debate. Whilst perhaps not of much interest to the lay reader, its significance as a contribution towards the fight against HIV/AIDS is enormous, particularly as it is a joint initiative from international experts in the field: Oxfam, ActionAid and Save the Children UK.

HIV/AIDS isn't going away
I make no apology for writing about her book now. This review, then, appears both to commend Sue Holden's international achievement, and also to raise a warning now so that the relevant local organisations have plenty of time to ensure that World AIDS Day is properly observed in Lancaster on 1 December this year.

Sue Holden has written for "policy makers, managers and programme staff … to promote debate about the challenges that confront them in a world which has been changed for ever by the pandemic of AIDS,' according to the blurb. I am sure she will not mind if I, too, call for debate and lay down a challenge for the local community to "confront' this issue.

A Modest Proposal
So my proposals are as follows. The local community needs to organise happenings such as:

• Events and celebrations
• Commemorations and remembrance
• Awareness-raising initiatives and educational activities

What is needed is an integrated approach. This should involve individuals and bodies like:

• Councillors, MPs (and government, dare one hope?)
• Health, care, social and education services
• Charities, the voluntary sector, community & arts centres and related support groups,
‘• Minority' sectors such as the LGB community, women's organisations and ethnic groups

You all know who you are.

It is only just over three months till the beginning of December. The countdown to a vocal, visible and valid local response on this year's World AIDS Day is beginning. During that time, the number of those who will die across the globe will continue to grow.

Lancaster has long had a tradition of care towards those in need – witness the events organised locally in response to the Cockling Tragedy. As Sue Holden has done, we need to make sure that we, as a community, make a worthwhile contribution to this challenge.

Copyright © 8 August 2004 Michael Nunn