A Day with the Boys: An HIV Confidential Counseling and Testing Event

On July 10, 2011 the Love Yourself (VINN Advocacy) group, a not-for-profit organization focused on HIV prevention among Men who have Sex with Men (MSM), in association with the Quezon City Health Department (QCHD), held their first advocacy project, “A Day with the Boys: An HIV Confidential Counseling and Testing Event” at 35 West Avenue, Quezon City. The event was undertaken together with volunteers from QCHD, Pinoy Plus, Take The Test, and representatives from SaMACKA. The event was able to serve a total of 54 clients from 10am to 5pm on that day.

All 54 clients that were counseled and tested declared themselves as Men who have Sex with Men (MSM).

As per DOH protocol, during the post-test counseling and release of the rapid HIV test result, all clients were given instructions:

The blood samples of clients that turned out reactive will be sent to National Reference Laboratory-STD AIDS Cooperative Central Laboratory / San Lazaro Hospital to undergo the confirmatory test. The QCHD will contact the client after two weeks and the results will be given. If confirmed positive, the client will undergo further laboratory tests, most importantly the CD4 level to determine the need for administration of anti-retroviral drugs.

For all others that received non-reactive results for the test, they were encouraged to take the voluntary HIV Confidential Counseling and Testing after three months.