UNAIDS unveils Y+ beauty pageant to fight HIV stigma

The joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has unveiled the 2024 edition of the Y+ beauty pageant, an initiative for empowering young people living with HIV and promoting infection prevention in Uganda.

Held annually, the Y+ beauty pageant is an initiative of the Uganda Network of Young People Living with HIV (UNYPA) which started in 2014. Through it, young persons living with HIV (YPLHIV) are selected to serve as champions and advocates for the community where they engage in school and community outreaches and present the views and concerns of their colleagues at national and international high-level meetings.

Ms Sarah Nakku, the UNAIDS Country Community Mobilisation and Networking Adviser, said the initiative has been essential in fighting HIV infections in the country.

“The Y+ beauty pageant helps us to fight stigma mainly among adolescents and young people. When you look at the infections in the country, as of last year, we registered 38,000 new infections and 15,000 of those are among adolescents and young people, and 80 percent of that 15,000 were among adolescent girls and young women. The beauty pageant, for the past ten years since it started, has played a critical role in fighting stigma and discrimination,” she said.

Mr Trevor Emojel, the Mr Y+ 2022, said in his tenure, he has represented the young positives in platforms where policies and laws are developed.

“As Mr Y+ 2022, I’ve used my platform to speak out against HIV/AIDS stigma and represent issues affecting young people, like access to jobs for those living with HIV/AIDs,” he said.

Mr Emojel observed that in addition to low engagement of young people in meetings where policies and plans for interventions are developed, some government agencies are still not very receptive to discussions around HIV/AIDS and its impact on young people. He indicated that this could be contributing to the limited impact of some of the interventions in the HIV/AIDS fight.

“It is important that we prioritise young people in the planning because, at the end of the day, young people are the experts when it comes to handling their problems,” he said.

Dr Dan Byamukama, the head of HIV prevention at the Uganda AIDS Commission has urged the public to embrace and support the initiatives of young people towards improving the impact of HIV/AIDS interventions.

“Y+ beauty is an activity that is oftenmisunderstood but for us, in HIV response, we know its place. We know that if we are going to end AIDS as a public health threat in this country, we should identify people living with HIV, empower them to live freely without stigma and take their medication well.  We know that for persons living with HIV, when they take their medication well, they live healthy lives and they don’t transmit HIV,” he said. 

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