Terri Butler (Griffith, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) 1 December marks World AIDS Day, which is held every year to raise awareness about the issues surrounding HIV and AIDS, and is a day for people to show their support for people living with HIV and to commemorate people who have died; and

(b) the theme for World AIDS Day this year is 'Getting to zero: Zero new HIV infections. Zero discrimination. Zero AIDS related deaths';

(2) acknowledges the roles played by people living with HIV and their friends, family, supporters, AIDS activists and researchers, past and present, in making HIV a disease people can live with; and

(3) affirms its commitment to support actions which will reduce stigma, prevent new HIV transmissions, and work towards a cure.

Tomorrow is Word AIDS Day. This year's theme is getting to zero—zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination, zero AIDS related deaths. Australia will not get to zero without effort and focus. Our country must continue to strive to stamp out AIDS and HIV, and getting to zero is a task that is part of a much broader project of getting justice for the LGBTI community.

I acknowledge and remember those who have lost their lives to AIDS. I also thank those who have cared for others as they have died. It is the height of love to care for someone who is dying. I remember those HIV and AIDS experts who died when MH117 went down. They were traveling to the International AIDS Conference in Melbourne. Losing them was a tragedy.

I think most people hoped that, by 2015, new HIV cases, discrimination against positive people, and AIDS-related deaths would be a thing of the past here. But, according to the Kirby Institute, there were 1,081 cases of HIV infection newly diagnosed in Australia in 2014. It is estimated that there are now 27,150 people living with HIV in Australia. In addition, there has been an increase in syphilis over the past 10years and a worrying spike in this disease in northern Australian communities this year. These facts go to show that AIDS, HIV and STIs will not just decrease naturally with time. It takes effort, resources and commitment to meet this public health challenge.

So I acknowledge the Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations and, from my home state, the Queensland AIDS Council. QuAC runs HIV prevention programs, provides services and support and is a strong voice on HIV and gay issues. For example, when the Newman Liberal-Nationals government closed the Biala Sexual Health Clinic the year before, QuAC opened Clinic 30. It is staffed by two section 100 prescribing doctors. The clinic provides testing and immediate treatment for all STIs.

I also acknowledge my good friend and constituent Phil Carswell, who was this year awarded an Order of Australia for his significant contribution over many decades to the development of the Australian response to HIV. Since the mid-1980s, Phil has championed peer delivered health and ensured that the voices of gay men have been heard nationally. I saw Phil over the weekend and he told me that he had joined the QuAC board. I am not at all surprised to hear that he is continuing his advocacy and his work. I am sure that he and a lot of other Queenslanders will attend QuAC's World AIDS Day Candlelight Vigil at Reddacliff Place tomorrow night from 6.45pm.

I mentioned Clinic 30. The doctors there provide scripts for the importation of pre-exposure prophylaxis, which is known as PrEP. As the name suggests, HIV-negative people can take PrEP to prevent HIV transmission. PrEP has been described as a game changer for HIV and HIV prevention. It gives gay men and other men who have sex with men the ability to take greater control over their own sexual health. PrEP is not yet available domestically. Labor recognises the importance of renewing efforts to reduce the spread of HIV-AIDS, including adopting prophylactic treatments, subject to the approval of independent regulators and any recommendation from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee. Like all new prevention measures, PrEP has its limitations. Because it will not protect you from all STIs, taking PrEP is not a reason to stop using condoms. It is important to make sure PrEP use does not lead to complacency about protection from STIs.

As I mentioned, there has been an outbreak of syphilis in Northern Australian communities. In urban communities, syphilis is predominantly transmitted between men who have sex with men. So, although there are a lot more prevention measures coming onto the market and coming into the community for HIV, it remains very important that people take other measures to protect themselves from STIs like syphilis. It is an absolute shame that in 2015 we are seeing babies being born affected by syphilis. It is a tragedy, and it is something that our community needs to continue to work against.

As I said earlier, getting to zero is an important task in the project of justice for LGBTI people. Marriage equality is another important part of that. In the Queensland parliament, LNP members are being given a free vote on civil unions. That should happen here on marriage equality. The Prime Minister should show leadership and deliver a free vote. Though getting to zero in respect of HIV and AIDS and delivering marriage equality are both important, neither is enough. I want Australia to be a country where LGBTI people no longer face discrimination, where your sexuality is not a basis for harassment, where there are no hate crimes, where you have access to the health care you need and where no-one feels like a second-class citizen—a just society. I urge each of my colleagues to recognise World AIDS Day.

Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and I reserve my right to speak.

Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am wearing a red ribbon today to show my support for people living with HIV and to commemorate those who have died, especially those who have helped change public attitudes and made HIV a disease people can live with. The global World AIDS Day theme for this year continues on from last year's theme: 'Getting to Zero: Zero new HIV infections. Zero discrimination. Zero AIDS related deaths'. In order to achieve this, we need a clear plan and strategy. The Seventh National HIV Strategy sets a direction for Australia to reverse the trend of increased HIV diagnoses and to work towards eliminating HIV transmission in this country.

The AIDS 2014 Legacy Statement commits the Australian government and the eight states and territories to taking all necessary action, in partnership with key affected communities and sector partners, to remove barriers to testing, treatment, prevention, care and support across legal, regulatory, policy, social, political and economic domains. In this regard, the coalition has also announced a number of practical measures to support the early testing and treatment of HIV. Restrictions preventing the manufacture and sale of HIV home self-tests were removed and, from 1 July this year, PBS subsidised HIV antiretroviral medicines can be dispensed and accessed through a pharmacy of the patient's choice.

Australia has a strong record of nonpartisan leadership in responding to the HIV epidemic, resulting in one of the lowest prevalence rates in the world. The member for Griffith is no doubt proud that Queensland was the first state in Australia to sign up to a new HIV treatment program which promises to eliminate the transmission of HIV by 2020. The former Newman government last year signed a memorandum of understanding with Canada's British Columbia Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS.

Australia has come a long way since we first heard about HIV and AIDS. The 1980s was a time when we knew so little about HIV and AIDS that, in the absence of scientific knowledge, ignorance, intolerance and fear replaced reason. Who can forget those confronting 1987 grim reaper advertisements? While the grim reaper successfully scared us about the dangers of HIV and AIDS, it also divided and polarised the Australian community. It made the healthy fear the sick and sick-looking. Friends were scared of touching friends. Sick people were traumatised. Australia's gay community were blamed and vilified, sometimes in public acts of aggression and violence. But the public health awareness campaigns did have the desired effect. We have learned a lot since then. Thirty years along that journey and here we are on the eve of World Aids Day 2015, and we are now talking about eliminating new HIV infections within five years in Australia.

Australia is rightly proud of its leadership in the response to HIV and AIDS. We have contributed more than $1 billion to the international HIV response in the past decade. Bilaterally, Australia is supporting HIV-AIDS activities and programs in Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. At the global and regional levels, we support UNAIDS so as to ensure global efforts to address the disease capture needs in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as in Africa. However, we cannot be complacent. We must be vigilant in our ongoing action to address the remaining challenges in Australia and our region: weak health systems, stigma and discrimination, laws and policies that inhibit marginalised populations' access to services, and persistent barriers for women and girls to claim their sexual and reproductive health rights.

I acknowledge the significant roles played by people living with HIV, their friends, family, and supporters and activists and researchers—past and present—in making HIV a disease with which people can live. For many Australians and their families, the journey to get to this milestone has been long and painful. Countless men, women and even children have died along the way. Others have suffered long-term incapacity or tenuous health. Today, because of them, we are implementing a plan to virtually eliminate new HIV infections in Australia. I thank the member for Griffith for her motion today.

Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today in support of World AIDS Day, which falls tomorrow, as the member for Griffith has mentioned. I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this subject, and I thank the member for Griffith for moving this motion.

I have spoken many times before about the story of AIDS and how, through the incredible work of scientists, researchers and medical professionals like my sister, HIV and AIDS can now not only be prevented but be treated. I can recall a time—it seems not so long ago, Mr Deputy Speaker, and you are about the same vintage as me—when the threat and fear of AIDS gripped this nation. I am talking here about the 1980s. It was a great, unknown terror. Nobody knew what it was or what it meant. All it meant, essentially, was certain death. It was an epidemic. In Melbourne, where I was living, it seemed almost every person my age, including me, had lost a friend or loved one to this disease.

The result of this fear, of this trauma, of this lived experience was that people became informed, they became vigilant and they protected themselves. In the eighties my sister, who is a scientist, worked in AIDS research at the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne. I remember talking to her about her work as we went from being totally in the dark about this disease to knowing it, to gradually getting an understanding of it and, through that, to being able to control it. HIV is now a manageable infection and no longer a gradual progression to AIDS and then death. Treatments not only control the virus; they can reduce its infectiousness. The progress that has been made in tackling this disease in what seems like a relatively short couple of decades is nothing short of remarkable.

However, there seems to have been, unfortunately, an unintended flip side to this progress. As treatment has progressed, fear has subsided and so too, it would seem, has our vigilance. It is alarming that over the past 15 years the number of new HIV diagnoses has gradually increased—from 719 diagnoses in 1999 to 1,081 in 2012. It is estimated that 27,150 Australians are currently living with HIV, and around 350 Canberrans are living with HIV. This reiterates the need for vigilance. Those of us who were there in the 1980s particularly remember and reiterate the need for vigilance.

The theme for World AIDS Day this year is the same as last year: getting to zero—zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS related deaths. The elimination of HIV is something that the UN's Secretary-General's Special Envoy for AIDS believes is achievable in the Asia-Pacific region within the next 15 years. However, it will only be achieved if we are vigilant and avoid complacency. I cannot underscore that enough. We have to be vigilant and we have to avoid complacency.

I believe it is the responsibility of those of us who lived through the birth of the HIV-AIDS epidemic in this country to keep the younger generations informed. I say to them: sit down with those of us who went through that living hell in the eighties, those of us who, like me, lost friends. My husband lost friends. We lost friends who died in only their 20s and went blind and were incredibly traumatised before they died. Anyone who lived through the eighties in their 20s, as I said earlier, knew someone who was touched by this disease, and most of us knew someone who died. So I encourage the younger generation to sit down with those of us who are just a bit older to listen to our experiences and the horror of watching that unfold and the great sadness of losing friends in their 20s who had so much to give and who lost their lives so early and, quite often, in very, very difficult, challenging and painful circumstances, covered in sarcomas. It was tragic.

We must be vigilant. We must avoid complacency. I say to people: always practice safe sex. When travelling overseas, be prepared. Take protection with you as it might not be available where you are going. Do not share syringes and other personal items like razors. Also, get tested regularly.

In closing, I want to congratulate Philippa Moss from the AIDS Action Council of the ACT who was recently awarded the Telstra ACT Business Woman of the Year— (Time expired)

Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to rise today to also speak on the motion on World Aids Day. I thank the previous speakers for their contributions as well. Tomorrow marks World AIDS Day, held every year to raise awareness about the issues surrounding HIV and AIDS. It is a day to show support and also to commemorate, sadly, those people who have died. The HIV epidemic is one of the largest epidemics our world is facing, and Australia is working bilaterally, regionally and globally to address the threat. Australia remains committed to supporting an effective, equitable and sustainable HIV response in our immediate region, the Indo-Pacific.

We should also acknowledge the substantial progress that has been made in expanding access to HIV prevention, treatment and care services and particularly the focus on achieving epidemic control. We hope to end AIDS as a health threat. With more people receiving treatment now more than ever before, we have seen a decline in new cases globally.

The Australian government pledged $200 million to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria for 2014-2016, supporting its efforts to eliminate the three diseases. The benefit of this commitment can be seen in the statistics: 2.9 million people living with HIV in the Indo-Pacific region have been receiving antiretroviral treatment from global fund support; globally, 423 million people have received HIV counselling and testing through global fund grants; and 5.1 billion condoms have been distributed through the global fund to prevent the spread of HIV. While Australia is stepping up the battle against the worldwide spread of the disease, we must also acknowledge that we have not been completely successful domestically either.

Tomorrow is a great reminder that much more needs to be done in Queensland, which is one of the states that has witnessed a gradual increase in the number of new HIV notifications. Combined with its size and widespread population centres, Queensland faces its own unique problems. My own seat of Brisbane has also seen a growing number of HIV cases, for which I will continue to fight for more funding and resources. We, as the federal government, can and must do more to reverse the spread of this dreadful disease.

Another goal of the day is to affirm the commitment to support actions which reduce the stigma surrounding HIV infection, prevent new HIV transmissions and work towards a cure. I, like the member for Canberra, also saw the terrible stigma in the 1980s—the fear, scaremongering and discrimination. I experienced it every day in my own family's restaurant. It is an episode that I am sure that many of us never ever want to go through again. It really did not need to be that way, but it certainly elicited a great deal of fear in the community at the time.

I want to pay tribute to the many dedicated and committed local organisations and volunteers who provide invaluable and much-needed support, particularly the great work that they do in providing guidance to those affected by HIV and their families. In the electorate of Brisbane, the Queensland AIDS Council does a fantastic job—and I want to particularly acknowledge CEO Joanne Leamy. I also want to acknowledge Queensland Positive People; Rapid; the Ethnic Communities Council of Queensland, which reaches out to the many communities that it represents by providing greater education and counselling; the Gay and Lesbian Welfare Association; and, particularly, a new foundation that has only been in existence for a few short years—HIV Foundation Queensland. I also want to pay tribute to the health minister at the time, Lawrence Springborg, who announced free HIV testing and ensured that that was expanded, particularly as part of AIDS Awareness Week back at the end of 2013. That was very much appreciated, particularly the after-hours HIV testing clinic.

Tomorrow is not just about taking stock of what has been achieved and what is yet to be achieved; it is also about the realisation that real lives are at stake. Tomorrow is not just to mark the fighting of a disease; it is also to remember the toll that has been taken, and is still being taken, on those who have that battle.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am proud to join with other members here in the chamber to speak on this motion that not only celebrates how far we have come in the fight against AIDS but also, sadly, highlights how far we still have to go to change attitudes, stop new infections and, above all, put an end to AIDS-related deaths. In the HIV Foundation Queensland video, HIV stigmaI have judged … other people are going to judge me, the mother of a man with HIV says: 'When somebody tells you my sister has got cancer, you go "ohhh" and "I'm very sorry to hear that". They do not react in the same way about HIV-positive people.' It is that stigma which remains the biggest barrier today towards meeting the World Aids Day theme—'Getting to zero. Zero new HIV infections. Zero discrimination. Zero AIDS-related deaths'. It is this stigma that the Hawke government tackled head-on with its landmark Grim Reaper campaign in the 1980s that helped change the mindset here about how best to protect all Australians from AIDS. It was Labor that established Medicare and the PBS which, in tandem, ensure that no-one with HIV-AIDS is denied medical care or the retrovirals that now mean HIV is no longer a death sentence.

Indeed, the vast majority of patients with HIV will no longer go on to develop AIDS and will be able to successfully manage their condition and remain relatively healthy for the rest of their lives. But there is still a huge way to go. Just over a decade ago, when it was hoped we were on the brink of zero new HIV infections, infection rates started to rise again and have now levelled off at just over 1,000 a year. The Kirby Institute's 2015 annual surveillance report found that there are an estimated 27,150 people in Australia who are HIV positive and there were 1,081 new diagnoses of HIV, which is very similar to the 1,028 new cases in 2013 and the 1,064 new cases in 2012.

While there is some relief that the surge in new HIV cases that began around a decade ago appears to have been capped, it is obviously deeply disappointing to see the return of a disease that many had hoped—even predicted—would be eliminated by now. Clearly, complacency has set in, with many Australians obviously believing the great success we had in previous decades in dramatically reducing the numbers of Australians with HIV meant that HIV-AIDS was no longer the threat it had once been and that precautions could be abandoned. All Australians must continue to be made aware that HIV remains a very serious threat and that the transmission of HIV can be halted by safe sex practices and through harm minimisation with intravenous drug users. But we must also ensure that those living with HIV remain free from discrimination.

While absolutely nothing will ever take the place of prevention, in the meantime the PrEP pharmaceuticals do offer the hope of a daily drug that can help prevent the vast majority of new infections. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that daily PrEP can reduce the risk of getting HIV from sex by more than 90 per cent and by more than 70 per cent amongst those who inject drugs. It was this evidence that drove this year's ALP national conference to specifically back the introduction of PrEP in our national platform. In February this year, drug company Gilead began what is expected to be a 12-month process with the TGA to license Truvada for use as a PrEP in Australia. Even then, it could be months—even years—before the drug can be listed on the subsidised PBS, which would make it available for no more than $37.70 per script.

Labor accepts the need for proper processes to ensure Australia's health system is both safe and secure. But we will be closely watching this process to ensure that, should the experts recommend it, the government acts swiftly to ensure that PrEP is made available on Australia's PBS. But, as I said at the outset, our greatest emphasis must be on redoubling our efforts to educate all Australians about the risk of HIV-AIDS and to work together to eradicate this terrible disease, while supporting those who continue to live with HIV. Our aim must remain, absolutely, as it has been in the global World AIDS Day theme for the past five years: zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination, zero AIDS-related deaths.

Debate adjourned.