On Saturday, July 18, St. Paul’s Hospital Foundation and the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS (BC-CfE) co-hosted an intimate cocktail reception on the eve of the 8th IAS Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention (IAS 2015). In attendance were Dr. Julio Montaner, director of the BC-CfE, leading physicians and researchers from BC-CfE, Michel SidibÂŽ, executive director of UNAIDS, renowned HIV/AIDS researchers and addiction medicine specialists from around the world, and other notable international guests and local community leaders.
This special event honoured those early partners in the global fight against HIV/AIDS and celebrated the BC-CfE’s groundbreaking Treatment as Prevention (TasP) strategy, which has seen 15 million people receive highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) worldwide.
Speakers included luminaries such as Michel SidibÂŽ, UNAIDS executive director; Dr. Nora D. Volkow, Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse; Reverend Monsignor Robert J. Vitillo, head of Caritas Internationalis; Dr. Fabio Mesquita, director of the Brazilian Ministry of Health’s Department of STDs, AIDS and Viral Hepatitis; Dr. Zunyou Wu, director of the National Center for AIDS/STD Control and Prevention at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention; as well as our very own Dr. Julio Montaner, director of the BC-CfE; Dr. Robert Sindelar, president of the Providence Health Care Research Institute; and Dick Vollet, president and CEO of St. Paul’s Hospital Foundation.