00:00We need Colombia, through its ongoing health reform discussion, to put communities at the center of health systems.
00:17Okay, in the first place, I want to speak with you about an important event, like the Afro-descendant one.
00:28I want to ask you about the representation.
00:32Why is it important that you represent us in places like the director of our own city?
00:41What is the important part about the representation in an Afro-descendant woman?
00:46Afro-descendant women living in the diaspora of Africa face not only the gender discrimination
00:55that we all face from patriarchy globally, but also are on the receiving end of the harshest, most violent forms
01:05of racism and aggressive, violent capitalism and militarism.
01:11I have traveled in this region, and I see the data, the social and economic outcomes in this region of
01:19Latin America are worst for Afro-descendant people,
01:24and among them Afro-descendant women.
01:28So I came here the invitation of your vice president, who her own election, her own appointment as vice president
01:41is historic,
01:42and she's playing a historic role in bringing us all together as black women from Africa,
01:48from the diaspora of Africa, to stand together, to make our struggle visible,
01:55to make our voices heard.
01:58So I came to join her and other women to make a demand, a call for a United Nations Day
02:06for the rights of Afro-descendant women.
02:12And I am taking this demand, together with me, to the highest level of the United Nations,
02:20to Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who is my boss,
02:24to ask him to look into this because we need the global solidarity
02:29to address patriarchy, militarism, capitalism that is pushing.
02:38Yeah, and give us an opportunity to take decisions in our lives.
02:44Absolutely.
02:44Because you are our representation.
02:46And the next question that I have for you is about your work.
02:50And it's other thing that is important for us.
02:55What are the strategies that we can analyze or tell about, or I know,
03:01our children, our friends, different topics about ONU-SIDA?
03:07You're asking me a question about the role of education and in promoting good health of people.
03:16Well, I'll take it back to how you can fight a disease like HIV and end it.
03:24We know from a long experience of working on HIV that although everything is there for prevention,
03:37to stop people getting infected, and we have also a lot of scientific tools for getting people on treatment,
03:45but many people still get infected.
03:50In Colombia, 9,000 people were infected last year, whom we know.
03:55Could be more.
03:57We also know that people are still dying, even though they can go on treatment and not die.
04:03So, why?
04:05Because they face inequalities in access to information, in access to the health system to get condoms
04:16and to get everything they need, and in access to, and lack of rights.
04:22The rights, the freedom to make choices for yourself, like sexual violence.
04:27You might want not to be infected, but if you are forced into unprotected sex.
04:33So, we know that we need to work through education, through community services, community empowerment,
04:42through the health system which reaches everybody who has a need,
04:47through human rights promotion and defense through civil society organizations,
04:54in order to address a disease like HIV.
04:58So, what you're asking me about the education system?
05:02Yes, education must include sexuality education, especially for girls.
05:08How can you know about, how can you protect yourself from infection,
05:14if you don't even know about your body, and how to live a healthy life?
05:20So, we have to use the education system, but we also have to use communities, empower communities,
05:27mothers to know what is right, the right food, the right health care, the right sanitation for their children.
05:34So, we say you need a multi-sector approach, an approach which involves all departments of government
05:44to address a disease like HIV, but most importantly we say that it is communities
05:52that will protect people's health, deliver people's right health.
05:58So, you need your government, we need Colombia through its ongoing health reform discussion,
06:06to put communities at the center of health systems.
06:10They need, we need to have communities empowered with rules that make them part of health service delivery,
06:20but also with resources to reach their people.
06:24It is communities who know who needs help, it's communities who are trusted
06:29to give prevention messages. So communities, communities are very important here, but also getting
06:37the education, the health, the ministry of gender, of equality, to all work together
06:44to protect, to give people the right to health.
06:47My final question for you is about inequality, because if we analyze that it is important to have
06:56education to support other ideas, other projects about this, it's necessary still to analyze that it's not the same
07:04when you analyze the situation in the municipal cities and the territories. And since this,
07:13my question is this, how we can to support or to create strategies for when you are trying to support
07:23or to confront your health. Because in Bogota, it's necessary or you can just go to different places,
07:35I don't know, the family, but in other places like territories, where you can find schools or different things like
07:45this,
07:45how you can or how these communities can to support or to confront their health.
07:53Addressing inequalities is key. Reducing inequalities is the way through which you can give everybody
08:03their right to health, their right to education, their right to a good life.
08:07So if I look at this region of Latin America, it is the most unequal region in the world.
08:15It's the highest levels of inequality are in this region. And that is why many people are in countries
08:24that are rich like yours, but are still living a quality of life that is having no quality of life
08:33because of these inequalities. I said to your minister today that Colombia is very rich,
08:43very rich country. The resources, the industrial base, the technology, the scientific base, huge.
08:52However, on HIV, only 77% of people living with HIV have been tested. So you have about 200,000
09:08people living with HIV,
09:10maybe only about 150 have been tested. A small country like Swaziland, very poor in Africa,
09:21has already passed. 95% of its people have been tested and are on treatment. So it tells you that
09:31this
09:31is because of inequality because Colombia has more money put even in its health system, but it is not
09:40reaching the last person. It is staying here and helping those who are already rich, right? So it's a question
09:50of
09:51addressing that inequality, reaching those who are not rich today. And who are they? It is the Afro
10:00descendants, it is the indigenous people, it is the people living in the territories, it is not your
10:07urban rich people. So the challenge for Colombia and this region is very much about not leaving anybody
10:17behind. Closing the inequality gaps. Challenging inequalities is the most important way to achieve
10:27the right health. The right health for everybody and to end AIDS. Thank you so much.
10:32Closing the inequality gaps. Thank you so much.
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