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Founder, Acción Solidaria

Tackling AIDS in Venezuela
43 minutes, 19.7mb, recorded 2008-05-09
Image caption: Feliciano Reyna
Feliciano Reyna

Turning the spotlight on the health sector, host Sheela Sethuraman interviews Feliciano Reyna about his efforts in fighting the AIDS epidemic in Venezuela. Reyna, Founder of Acción Solidaria, discusses the value of using a 'comprehensive AIDS care' approach where education plays a vital role alongside prevention and care.

Thanks to Reyna, Acción Solidaria has been successful in drawing the attention of various constituent groups. On one hand, his organization offers the best possible prevention and care services to those affected by HIV. On the other, it monitors discriminatory practices and brings them to attention of responsible parties.

Reyna discusses how he has successfully engaged not only health professionals, but also media and numerous businesses. He also shares impressive statistics on the number of people Acción Solidaria has served over the past years. However, he also expresses concerns about the slow pace of change compared to some of the neighboring countries and hopes for greater commitment from the government in the years ahead.


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Feliciano Reyna began to channel his personal experience into public action following the death of his partner from AIDS in 1994. Beginning with a pilot center in Caracas, Feliciano has built a network of AIDS community service centers throughout Venezuela that offer all aspects of AIDS education, prevention, and care. His organization Acción Solidaria (Action for Solidarity) offers both prevention services to the general public and care services to those already infected with the virus. This sensitizes the public to people with AIDS and fosters prevention through shared experiences. Acción Solidaria has trained nearly 300 educators and directly informed over 28,000 people about AIDS prevention and care. Feliciano was a finalist for the Red Ribbon Award at the World AIDS Conference in Toronto, and speaks often as a recognized leader in the field.

Resources

This free podcast is from our Design For Change series.

For The Conversations Network:

  • Post-production audio engineer: Sheela Sethuraman
  • Website editor: Sheela Sethuraman
  • Series producer: Kevin Shockey