1 August 2024
“The INPUD Board Chair powerfully represented the community of people who use drugs when he delivered his invited address to the AIDS2024 Closing Session in Munich on 27 July. Ukrainian Anton Besanko spoke of his experiences as a person who uses drugs, living with HIV and with lived experience of hep C and incarceration.
He told the engaged listeners “I am here because someone put me first” and proposed a reworking of the conference slogan “Putting people first” to read “Put people first NOW!”.
Anton’s passion and authenticity roused the audience to get loud for drug law reform, ’til all shouted with him, repeating several times: “Rise and decriminalise!”.
The loud applause continued long after he had left the stage after his 10 minute speech.
This is what he had to say:
Dear distinguished delegates, dear guests, good afternoon. My name is Anton Basenko, I am a person living with HIV, with lived experience of hepatitis C, person who use drugs, and I am a Ukrainian.
First of all, as a Ukrainian, I cannot miss the opportunity to say a sincere thank you to all of you for your efforts and support for Ukraine in this terrible time. We saw it at the opening ceremony, you came up to express your support and even supported us with donations all the days of the conference. I want you to know, We appreciate it immensely and with you we will definitely win.
What is the feeling with which I stand on this stage? Well, I feel incredibly proud to be the voice of the community at the closing of this important conference, and at the same time I feel a great responsibility, because every word spoken here matters, because every word can save someone’s life. A little bit about my life.I think the numbers will be more illustrative: I am 44, my adolescence and first experiments were in the mid-90s, I started using psychoactive substances when I was 14 and injecting when I was 16, but my first clean syringe in a harm reduction program I received only when I was 23, at the same 23 I found out that I am living with HIV and hepatitis C. I had to wait 712 days for my immune system to reach the AIDS stage to finally be eligible to get my “golden ticket” to start ART and I had to wait 13 years for hepatitis C treatment when my liver almost reached cirrhosis stage. I survived 6 overdoses, 3 direct denials of medical care and 2 job losses due to my status, lost 3 close friends because of AIDS-related Tuberculosis, could have been imprisoned 4 times, had over 50 unsuccessful attempts to “treat” my drug dependence before I became one of the first 30 OAT patients in Ukraine.As you can see I am still alive, standing in front of you, and I am sure that this was possible because someone, once, in their small workplace or large area of responsibility, put a person first, put me first. We in communities always say “we are not numbers,” but the lives of community people are made up of numbers like you just heard. Now imagine that the moment I say this, millions of people from different communities, at this very moment, are still suffering from their “numbers”, and dying, not waiting, getting rejected, ending up in jail.
And all this in 2024, more than 40 years since we know about HIV infection and just over 5 years to 2030 when the whole world and governments have set themselves the goal of ending the AIDS epidemic. I think we simply have no choice, the time of declarations and beautiful conference titles is over, putting people first is now the sacred responsibility of every government, every policy maker and decision maker, and it is these “people”, representatives of all key affected communities, civil society, who must be included in all processes, as full participants and equal partners. There are no other options. Because Nothing About Us Without Us!
I’m from the Eastern European and Central Asian (EECA) region, the fastest-growing HIV epidemic in the world. In the region where one country, with the largest territory and one of the largest HIV epidemic in the world, Russia, dragging everyone back to the Dark Age, by destroying hospitals and killing civilians and kids in my country, and influencing other countries, propagating hate through homophobic and drug-phobic narratives and legislation.
Human rights for key populations in our post-Soviet states have always been poor. Criminalization is a fundamental problem and cross cutting issue for all communities.
In recent years, governments in the region, though we also see it globally, have increasingly adopted laws and practices that restrict civic space, threatening human rights activists, and placing additional pressure on already marginalized populations (LGBTQI+, people living with HIV, people and women who use drugs, sex workers, indigenous people and people in prisoner). KGB and Shtazi methods are back – they are used against my colleagues and activists like myself – from Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Belarus. Just imagine, my colleague from APH, the national coordinator of REAct and a well-known Ukrainian human rights activist, Maxym Butkevych, who went to serve and defend Ukraine and our European values, as a volunteer, was captivated and is being held in terrible prisons in Russia for the second year. Remember this hashtag: #FreeMaksymButkevych
We are sure If civil society and community organisations disappear due to political pressure, the HIV response in this region and globally will fail.
Community leaders in EECA region are now united with call to all potential allies, I want you to learn and repeat it with me: Rise and Decriminalise! (5 times).
But I wouldn’t want to talk only about sad things, we do summarise the results of the conference and try to imagine what’s next! We come away with a unique charge of energy and networking that needs to be used to maximum effect: here is just a small snapshot of what we have seen these days, and as communities, consider a priority for future work.
Innovations, innovations and innovations….
Virtual social workers and other digital solutions, long-acting ARV and OAT, medical assisted therapy for stimulant users and chemsexers.
Innovations in fundraising like cryptocurrency projects. U=U, including for people who use drugs, Prep (but not disvalue condoms), Mental health and wellbeing, OAT, Harm Reduction and combination prevention, drug consumption rooms, aging and HIV, SRHR programs, co-infections and co-morbidities, women and youth led initiatives, commmunity mobilization and community led responses at all levels. And of course Stigma reduction, funding increasing and partnerships building.
And all this needs to be scaled up and reach the hardest to reach at cosmic speed. What is important, and this is not the first conference we have heard this, is that “we have all the tools we need”.
But what we don’t have is time and every minute one person in the world continues to die of AIDS, so I want to rephrase the motto of the conference and call you “put people first now, put people first right now!”
And I really hope that when I attend the next conference, with another inspiring title, I will not face a feeling of insurmountable déjà vu because I have already seen and heard all this somewhere. And last but not least, my community peer from Uganda said at the opening that he is the first ever transgender man speaking at the opening of this conference. Well, I don’t know if I’m the first ever person who use drugs at the closing, but I’m sure we must keep doing that to hear and see communities in all its diversity and put them first.
Thank you for your attention. And Slavs Ukraini.”
And thank YOU, Anton, for representing us so well. People who use drugs deserve to be seen, listened to, believed, consulted with and put first by systems that invest appropriately in person-centred, evidence-based and stigma-free health care.