Community Innovation Program 2007
The GlaxoSmithKline – Shire Canada Community Innovation Program promotes innovative projects that meet the needs of targeted groups of people living with HIV/AIDS (PHAs) who face greater difficulty gaining access to services, antiretroviral treatment and the health system. The Program has granted $1,260,000 to more than one hundred and fifty-two projects over the past twelve years. Ten community-based AIDS organizations across Canada shared the $100,000 available in 2007.
This year’s Program recipients, and the amounts of their grants, are as follows:
AIDS Thunder Bay – AIDS, Buses, Computers: Reducing Barriers for PHAs. $5,000. Produce information packs for PHAs using simplified language on how to respond to an overdose, and on the rights and responsibilities for accessing hospital care; provide transportation to medical appointments; make computer workstations available to clients at the agency.
AIDS Vancouver – The Sahwanya Project. $12,000. Through community kitchens and peer support, provide opportunities for HIV+ African women living in the Lower Mainland to empower one another, access HIV/AIDS information in a supportive setting, and build knowledge and skills to meet their healthcare needs.
Fondation d’Aide Directe-SIDA Montréal – Eat Well to Keep Well. $10,000. In collaboration with a Community Health Centre nutritionist and local ASOs, to provide foods specific to African and Haitian diets thereby facilitating better PHA nutrition and consequently better antiretroviral effectiveness.
HIV & AIDS Legal Clinic (Ontario) – Immigration, HIV/AIDS and Health Care Project. $14,000. To train ASO frontline workers across Ontario how to advocate for their refugee and non-status clients to help these PHAs gain legal immigration status and access to the health care system.
L’ARCHE de l’Estrie – HIV: Living with Meaning. $10,000. In collaboration with community organizations, to develop and implement a workshop program for PHAs promoting a holistic approach to living with HIV thereby improving their capacity to adhere to antiretroviral therapy.
Mainline Needle Exchange – Barriers to HIV Testing among Rural Drug Users. $10,000. To increase the capacity of rural IDUs to opt for HIV testing through a skills and knowledge transfer program in collaboration with rural Nova Scotia stakeholders.
Northern AIDS Connection Society – SOS: Surviving on the Street. $1,000. To update a Nova Scotia HIV Community Resources Guide for incarcerated PHAs who are returning to society.
Ottawa Inner City Health – Use of narratives as an ARV Knowledge Transfer Tool. $14,000. Working in collaboration with community partners and the University of Ottawa’s Institute of Population Health, to test the use of narratives regarding HIV and antiretroviral adherence, to be developed and delivered by members of the homeless population as a knowledge transfer tool for their peers, with a long term goal of increasing their access to HIV treatment and enhancing ARV adherence.
SHARP Foundation – Outreach Care Program. $10,000. In collaboration with community partners, to launch an outreach program providing individualized supports for PHAs living outside SHARP Foundation facilities to help maintain client health and improve ARV adherence capacity.
Vancouver Native Health Society – Positive Women, Positive Spaces: A Community-Based Initiative to Address HIV/AIDS for Urban Aboriginal Women. $14,000. To launch a pilot project addressing the links between violence and risk for HIV infection amongst aboriginal women living in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side by creating and evaluating a women’s-only clinic night.