Student Health Services offered free HIV tests on Foggy Bottom and Mount Vernon as part of events leading up to World AIDS Day Friday.
World AIDS Day was created to spread awareness of the global HIV/AIDS crisis. Other events included a rally where students were arrested for protesting without a permit. Tests were held Friday from 1 to 3 p.m. on the Foggy Bottom Campus and Wednesday from 4 to 6 p.m. on the Mount Vernon Campus.
Students can normally get tested for HIV by visiting SHS, but must pay a $20 clinic fee for the visit. Last semester SHS held a testing event for several sexually transmitted diseases, including AIDS, gonorrhea and syphilis, but was forced to turn away students because of a lack of time and personnel, said Trey Watkins, assistant outreach coordinator for SHS.
He said testing was easier this year because of a new procedure using swabs rubbed against the gums. This only requires 20 minutes to process results as opposed to blood samples needing the hours to get results, said Susan Haney, SHS outreach coordinator. SHS was committed to testing everyone that came in for free testing last week, she said.
“We may have to turn people away – if there are hundreds of people we won’t be able to do it – but now that the testing is available, we will be able to schedule other times for people to do it,” Haney said.
Student volunteers from the Student Global AIDS Campaign encouraged students to get free HIV screening tests in Post Hall in the Mount Vernon Academic Building and in the Marvin Center Grand Ballroom. Members consider testing an important step in battling the AIDS crisis.
SGAC volunteer Tucker Landesman, a junior, said people should know if they have HIV or sexually transmitted infections so disease doesn’t spread and hurt others.
“I think that in a world which we know that HIV and STDs are out there – whether or not we’re using safer sex techniques with our partner or partners – knowing our status and sharing that status with our partners is the socially responsible thing to do,” Landesman said.
AIDS, or Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, is particularly dangerous in the D.C. area, which has the highest rate of infection in the United States. According to D.C. Appleseed, a nonprofit dedicated to District policy issues, one in 20 D.C. residents have Human Immunodeficiency Virus, the pathogen that causes AIDS. This rate is worse than many African countries, the report stated.
Several interested students helped make buttons and watched the screening of the documentary “Pandemic: Fight AIDS” at the Mount Vernon event Wednesday. Many were extremely supportive of the SGAC’s awareness events.
“I have just been to a few of their events and I know it’s World AIDS Week, so I’m going to sport the shirt and sport the button and support the cause,” said sophomore Brand Kroeger.
Rachel Stalnaker, the SGAC member who organized the Mount Vernon event, said she was glad freshman residents of Mount Vernon were interested in their cause. She lived on Mount Vernon her freshman year and said she realized how isolated the campus could be from the rest of the GW campus.
“We wanted to make sure the Mount Vernon community is included in our events.”
SGAC also held an information session for interested students in Kogan Plaza Tuesday and Thursday, co-sponsored a panel discussion on AIDS with the College Democrats Tuesday and participated in the World AIDS Day rally Friday. The student group worked with organizations like the World Health Organization and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to coordinate events for the day of awareness.
