Tapestry Health
By Patrick Geryk, a Tapestry Health Intern

On June 29, 2009 I set off to attend a conference in Boston hosted by The Multicultural AIDS Coalition in collaboration with the National African HIV Initiative (NAHI). This conference was part of the Black HIV/AIDS conference series; the specific focus of my conference was Black Immigrants and HIV.

It is imperative that we develop new strategies as a community to reach the Black immigrant population in order to provide them with adequate educational outreach methods surrounding the issue of HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases. The urgency of reaching this population is underscored by the fact that roughly 53% of new infections among Blacks in Massachusetts occur in individuals born outside the U.S. – Sub-Saharan Africa (37%) and Caribbean (27%).

Immediately the conference identified the four main challenges in reaching the Black immigrant population. The first and probably most difficult hurdle in educating Black immigrants on HIV/AIDS prevention is overcoming the stigma surrounding sex and HIV in the community. I learned that the Black immigrant community has difficulties talking about sex and HIV because it is considered a taboo subject and therefore ignored. A strategy suggested at the conference to breakdown this stigma surrounding discussions of sex and HIV, which was found to be successful, was educational outreach that is non-traditional. “Nontraditional” educational outreach consists of normalizing topics surrounding HIV and sex. By “normalizing”, the conference meant making the Black immigrant population feel comfortable about talking about HIV and sex through continual conversation and discussion. An effective method of achieving this was to work through faith communities such as churches and mosques as well as education through small discussion groups. The final approach to reducing the stigma that literally plagues the Black immigrant population is to enroll people in health insurance. Enrolling people in health insurance will help generate needed conversation regarding safe sex practices as well as the issue of HIV/AIDS.

The second hurdle identified in reaching the Black immigrant population was the issue of homophobia. The Black immigrant community traditionally does not like to recognize men who have sex with men or discuss the issue of sexual orientation because it is not accepted within the community. Men are not supposed to have sex with men and therefore are not acknowledged. One of the guest speakers, Tokes Osubu, Executive Director of Gay Men of African Descent (GMAD), discussed the issue of homophobia in the Black immigrant community. What he said is that homophobia usually doesn’t manifest in any type of violence or confrontation, but rather, if a gay man walks past a group of African immigrants as soon as he passes that group will begin quietly talking badly behind the gay man’s back. I thought this was an interesting description of homophobia in the Black immigrant community because it really painted the picture of how homophobia in the community contributes to the taboo of sex and HIV. The main goal developed to combat this hurdle of homophobia was to create more specifically targeted HIV information and services for gay Black immigrants. A final important point Mr. Osubu made in his speech was that, “we need to go beyond looking at ourselves as sexual animals”, in order to provide important HIV and sex related services to the African GLBTQ community.

The third issue identified in reaching this target population was gender dynamics. We need to break down the gender barriers to open up conversation about sex and HIV in the community. I thought the best example of how to do this was presented by Carine Siltz, Founder and Executive Director of African Advocates Against AIDS. Ms. Siltz developed a 3 class program to help break down gender barriers as well as the stigma in the African community. The first class was ethnic and gender pride. This class focuses on building an African woman’s self esteem and making her feel proud to be who and what she is. The second class focuses in on HIV education. This class educates women about HIV: what it is, how you contract the virus, way to prevent contracting the virus, etc. Finally, the third and final class focuses on communication skills. The purpose is to help women find ways to have the courage to talk about HIV/AIDS with their partner. This will help break down the gender barriers in combating HIV and the stigma that inhibits discussions of HIV and sex. Another very interesting program Ms. Siltz developed that I thought was genius was where her organization trained salon stylists to talk to African women about these 3 classes and the topics of sex and HIV. Siltz’s reasoning for such a program was that African women love to get their hair braided and this process takes a few hours, so why not train these stylists to generate discussions about sex and HIV with their clients. It is a perfect outlet for providing educational outreach services and according to Ms. Siltz it is very effective.

The fourth and final hurdle the conference addressed was the obvious language barrier. The ways in which this hurdles needs to be addressed as identified by the conference is through ESL classes, translation services, and cultural competency trainings to service the Black Immigrant population better. What I found most interesting was the discussion about cultural competency trainings. In order to be culturally competent we need to reach the Black immigrant population in a specified manner. Instead of addressing the entire Black immigrant population at once we need to break it down into sub-groups. For example, we need to develop programs that specifically target a particular culture; instead of just saying “Black”, we need to breakdown the cultures that compose the “Black” population such as: Jamaican, Black Asian, African, African American, etc. Being more culturally competent will allow for improved outreach services and better responses from the various black immigrant communities.

The Black Immigrants & AIDS conference was helpful in making me aware of better ways to particularly serve the Black immigrant population living in the U.S. Even more importantly it made me realize that we cannot just combat the HIV/AIDS epidemic as a whole single entity, but rather we must break the epidemic down so we can provide services to different communities that are culturally appropriate. This will help generate better responses from community members and effectively develop educational practices that work. I would like to thank the Multicultural AIDS Coalition and NAHI for a very informative and successful event!