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By Carlos Diego A. Rozul Everyone has talked about a particular status in his or her life, be it their relationship status, their financial status, and heck people talk about their problems on their Facebook status all the time! But one thing that’s rarely talked about is one’s HIV status. Despite its relevance today it is still greatly stigmatized and has been thought of as taboo by many. This monthly column aims to help facilitate discussion on issues surrounding HIV testing and living with HIV. This Valentine’s season, there may be a number of people who will feel pressured to find someone to potentially spend a lifetime, or at least a night, with. Some might go on a hugot status blast on their social media accounts, while others might be relatively more proactive and try their luck in dating apps. It seems being in a relationship is so romanticized that people want to rush into it. However, with 26 people being diagnosed as HIV positive every day [ 1 ] , do couples practice timely...

LoveYourself introduces an innovation with its new service called Couple’s HIV Counseling and Testing (CHCT), otherwise lightheartedly coined as LoveYourself Purple, designed for couples who wish to undergo HIV counseling and testing together. This service aims to provide intervention for couples so that they may plan for their future and discuss a realistic risk reduction plan that they can implement together. An important note to be mindful of with LoveYourself’s CHCT program is the nuance of the word “couple” which implies that at least two individuals who wish to avail the program are in a pre-sexual or sexual relationship. The Learning and Development arm of LoveYourself, Love University, together with one of its founding members, Chris Lagman, coordinated the training program for LoveYourself volunteers who will be counselors for this service. This service was developed with the backdrop of rising incidence of HIV infections among males who have sex with males (MSM), many of thes...