dance4life uk newsletter august 2011
DESCRIPTION
Amazing producer and Radio 1 DJ Toddla T talks of his support for dance4life. Plus find out about HIV drugs pricing and chances to train others, make media and take dance4life travelling!TRANSCRIPT
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in this issuetoddla t / be a development trainer / dance4life creative media group / action of the summer...dance4life goes travelling / d4l explains...what’s happening with HIV drug pricing
august 2011
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Toddla T says “Watch Me Dance (4life)”Incredible producer and Radio 1 DJ speaks of his support for dance4lifeOn the eve of his release of his eagerly anticipated second album, the appropriately titled Watch Me Dance, one of the hottest stars in dance music has spoken of his support for dance4life.
Toddla T, one of the UK’s most exciting producers and club DJs, has taken dance-floors by storm with his unique mix of “bass, beats, bleeps and wiggle”. His sound draws influences from all over the world, but is firmly rooted in his hometown of Sheffield, for which he is a proud ambassador.
Over recent years he’s produced and remixed tunes for some of the biggest names on the UK underground including Tinchy Stryder, Bashy, Ms Dynamite, Hot Chip, Gyptian and Gorillaz) and become a regular fixture on BBC Radio 1 as part of the “In New DJs We Trust” show.
Chatting to dance4life UK, Toddla said, “HIV and AIDS is still a big issue, and I like the way dance4life uses music to bring people togeth-er and raise awareness. Biggup dance4life!”
Toddla’s new album comes out on the legend-ary Ninja Tune label on 15th August, but you can check out the title track, featuring Roots Manuva his very own Youtube channel, which he likes to call Toddla TV.
URGENT! Move quickly for your chance to train your peers to take action on sexual health
DT or not DT?Wanna get more involved in dance4life? Or do you just love working with young people and helping them make a difference? Then maybe becoming a Development Trainer is the perfect opportunity for you.
A Development Trainer (DT) is a young person aged 18-25 who has been trained by dance4life to train agents4change. Each development trainer will be teamed with a school in their area to run 5 different hour long skills4life sessions with a school group during the course of an academic year. They teach about HIV and AIDS, and other Sexual and Reproductive Health and international development issues in more detail. They also support agents4change in taking action, and help them to record their actions so that dance4life UK can show the international community that young people in the UK are active in their concern about the global HIV epidemic.
To apply go to http://www.restlessdevelopment.org/uk-jobs and scroll down the page til you see “dance4life Development Trainer”. You’ll need to be available to attend our amazing, interactive training weekend with the all the other future development trainers, in Birmingham on 17th -18th September (arriving there on the 16th), so make sure you book those dates into your diary now.
Youth Engagement Officer Rach said “Being a DT is a really great way to engage with young people! It’s an amazing op-portunity to raise awareness about sexual health, HIV and AIDS and other issues facing young people in a fun, non-formal environment.”
For more informa-tion email [email protected]
Learn about and get involved in making media with the dance4life Creative Media Group
Get Creative!The end of July saw the first installment of the dance4life Creative Media Group, de-signed to help YOU get involved in learning about and making media with dance4life.
An exciting new project, it trains agents4change in new skills in order to help them find new ways to raise awareness.
The first session involved training in interview techniques, sound recording and editing audio, all building towards an exciting new project you’ll be hearing more about over the coming months.
Sarah, one of the agents4change taking part, said “‘I’m really excited to be part of the creative media group and feel it’s going to be a great opportunity to learn new skills and meet interesting people.”
The Creative Media Group will be running regularly over the coming months, with ses-sions planned on photography, video, and working with the press. To find out more and get involved, email [email protected]
Action of the Summerdance4life goes travelling!!
A little hint…For example, if you were going to Paris you might want to take your pic in front of the Eiffel Tower…
Get creative!The person with the most unusual picture will also win a dance4life t-shirt!
What?The summer holidays are upon us, so why not take a dance4life holiday?
This summer join us in spreading the dance4life mes-sage far and wide and take a dance4life logo with you on your travels!
Don’t forget…Once you’ve taken your pics, send them into Rach at [email protected] and we will display entries on face-book and our website.
Happy travels dance4lifers, we look forward to seeing your pics!
Eh?All you have to do is print off the dance4life logo (click the link) and pack it in your suitcase along with your other travel essentials. When you reach your destination, take a picture of you and your dance4life logo in front of a building, monument, park (your choices are endless) that represents the place you’re in.
dance4lifeexplains...What’s the deal with HIV drugs pric-ing and “middle-income countries”?This month I decided to look into the com-plicated world of HIV drug pricing; what’s happening and what’s going to be the af-fect on people who need them? The con-cept for this article came whilst reading the report by the charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) on HIV drugs. Here MSF claimed that HIV drugs were becoming too costly for middle-income countries, so that’s why I ask the question…
‘What’s going on with HIV drugs pricing?’
HIV drugs (called ARVs or antiretrovirals) are drugs used to help a person living with HIV lead a normal life by suppressing the HIV virus. New drugs, now available, mean the difference in life expectancy between someone living with HIV and taking these new ARVs, and someone without the vi-rus, is one month. Read that again. Just one month.
The problem is this; drugs cost a lot of money, particularly up-to-date ones. The newest drug by pharmaceutical company Merck costs $5,870 per person per year in Brazil. The HIV population of Brazil is 730,000 people, so if each of these people were to go on this new drug* it would cost the Brazilian government over $4bn every year! A lot of countries simply cannot af-ford these new drugs and so patients are left on cheaper drugs that are less suc-cessful at suppressing the HIV virus.
Thankfully many of the pharmaceutical companies use a system of tiered pric-ing, where people in low-income coun-tries (such as countries in Sub-Saharan Africa) have to pay significantly less for the drugs. This will hopefully lead to increased access in countries such as Uganda (al-though currently only 36% of people liv-ing with HIV in low and middle-income have access to treatment, so we still have some way to go). The additional problem is countries with some of the highest HIV populations such as India (with the world’s 3rd largest HIV population) and Brazil are not classified as low-income countries and therefore have to pay up to 6 times more for their drugs than low-income countries. The fear is by excluding more countries (49 countries recently excluded by one com-pany!) from reducing drug costs there will be a decrease in the access that people in middle-income countries have to new HIV treatments, leading to more deaths from HIV-related illnesses.
* This of course assumes they are all viable for the drug and have access to services
This document has been produced with the financial assistance of the European Union. The contents of this document are the sole responsibility of Restless Development and can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the European Union.
ways to donateweb: www.justgiving.co.uk/dance4lifeuk
cheque: please make all cheques payable to Restless Development and post todonations / dance4life / 7 Tufton Street / London / SW1P 3QB
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So far...
A change for the better
- 173,000 youth participated in the school workshop tour- 52,000 young people became agents of change
- We distributed an amazing 3 million dance4life condoms to youth- Over £3 million raised for local HIV prevention projects in the global south
- dance4life anthem by Tiësto feat. Maxi Jazz was a worldwide hit - At the United Nations millennium summit (september 2000), world leaders agreed to an ambi-
tious agenda for reducing poverty and improving lives, the eight millennium development goals are the result of that meeting. Goal number six addresses the push back of HIV and AIDS.
We have a goal – we want to have created a total of one million agents of change by World AIDS Day 2014 - to do this, we need your support!
Today’s generation have never known a world
without HIV, and of the 7,200 people infected
every day, half are under the age of 25. dance4life
can bring about a serious change by creating
a movement of actively involved young people.