AIDS Healthcare Foundation to hold free rapid HIV testing to mark World AIDS Day

AIDS Healthcare Foundation:

MEDIA NOTE:

• TV NEWS DESKS—GO LIVE at 10 pm or 11 pm from the heart of Hollywood with this important HIV prevention/World AIDS Day event just blocks from some of Hollywood’s hottest nightclubs

• Event is also a great opportunity to get B-roll and interviews for World AIDS Day, Tuesday, December 1^st

In observation of World AIDS Day this year, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the largest global AIDS group and which currently provides more than 15,000 free HIV and STD tests annually in California via its community-based testing programs, is hosting an extended day—and evening—of free rapid HIV testing this Saturday, November 28^th, starting at 10 am, going until 2 am Sunday at its ‘Out of the Closet’ Hollywood thrift store and testing location (6210 Sunset). The HIV testing marathon is being held as part of AHF’s ‘Testing Millions’ campaign, a worldwide initiative to test more than three million people in conjunction with the observance of this year’s World AIDS Day, Tuesday, December 1^st. In an effort to raise awareness about the event and HIV testing, LA’s KIIS radio station (102.7 FM) will have its mobile van broadcasting live from the testing event from 8 pm to 10 pm Saturday.

“There are currently as many as 15,000 HIV positive individuals in Los Angeles County who do not know their HIV status because they have never been tested for the virus,” said Whitney Engeran-Cordova, Director of AHF’s Public Health Division. “Through this marathon World AIDS Day testing event at Hollywood’s Out of the Closet site, we are trying to normalize and de-stigmatize the entire process of HIV testing so that people look at testing as a routine part of health care. We know that knowledge of one’s HIV status really helps us break the chain of new infections, as people take steps to reduce the risk of passing on their infection to others once they know their own status. With this testing event, we are proud to be a part of AHF’s larger worldwide ‘Testing Millions’ campaign. I strongly urge people with any questions about their own HIV status to come out and join us and get tested this weekend.”

The Hollywood Out of the Closet thrift store will also be open for retail sales during the entire extended testing marathon. As an added incentive to entice participants to the testing event, all patrons at the Hollywood Out of the Closet store will enjoy a discount on all thrift store purchases between the hours of 7 pm Saturday and 2 am Sunday—hours when the retail store (and testing site) are usually closed.

The ‘Testing Millions’ World AIDS Day 2009 global testing campaign has been organized by AIDS Healthcare Foundation in coalition with hundreds of global partners mobilizing non-governmental organizations (NGOs), local and national governments, international relief agencies, faith-based organizations, civil society, and the media for a collaborative effort to conduct more than three million tests during an extended week of testing surrounding the observation of World AIDS Day 2009.

Source: AIDS Healthcare Foundation