STORIES OF HOPE

On Mandela Day 18th of July 2021, we embarked on a journey to co-create inspiring ‘Stories of Hope’ together with the global HIV community. We began as a group of People Living with HIV&AIDS (PLWHIV) with a migrant background to articulate and share our struggle to overcome HIV stigma and how our talents help us to open up and grow into the HIV community icons that many of us are day.

The pain, loss and grief of dealing with and our fight against the HIV epidemic is shared by so many more; Orphans of parents that passed away who are discriminated, family members whose relations are strained, caregivers of people living with HIV, activists campaigning for PrEP access, and so on. So, since 2023 we also celebrate the contributions of our allies in our fight against the HIV epidemic and on-going stigma and discrimination by including their stories on our platform.

SHARE TALENT

Stories of Hope is dedicated to all courageous Heroes of Hope sharing their talent, helping to break HIV stigma and discrimination.

BREAK STIGMA

Every story about overcoming and fighting HIV stigma is worth sharing as they will help the global HIV community to bring us closer to break HIV stigma and inequities in HIV action that persist until today and encourage PLWHIV to reach out to support networks and improve their access to health services!

Click on an image below to meet our talents living with HIV and allies in our fight to end HIV stigma:

Stories of Hope started as a locally-led initiative in a city in the Netherlands called Amersfoort where we brought a group of PLWHIV together and empower them to connect between themselves and other people facing stigma and discrimination. Stories of Hope was able to:

Provide a local safe space for people with a migrant background to design and share our stories related to stigma in the community.
Demonstrate that, through the safe space and tapping into their unique talents, there is willingness to open up and share our stories.
Empower PLWHIV with a migrant background to uncover the talents we use in our journey to overcome HIV stigma.

Today Stories of Hope has grown into a global community of Heroes of Hope. We continue to reach out to new HIV icons and work together to capture and share inspiring stories in our fight for equity in HIV action and against HIV stigma.

We are happy to engage with other local support-/ activist groups to share experiences and jointly explore opportunities for equitable HIV action to fight stigma and discrimination.