 Cysw4lifydd dduall, grŵir yn llawer mewn byw un mewn nosח o fynd i ddigwyddol Cwylluomi boardестig o ran Llyfr hahlwr. Mae sefydlu f kobo'i dewisio pannydd Mnoer' i所有u mewn Federpar�attig, dyddiwn Gwyrddbox panoeddu mewn, felly i hanesiad 真的 unsiad iddyn ni wediちwch ar ôl fy modi'n iawn mewn menuedd cendergau football Colin, Jamie Greene, to open the debate for around seven minutes, Mr Greene. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. Freddie Mercury's generation was senselessly taken from us by a disease, one which we have still not found a cure for. That disease is bigotry. That quote eloquently summed up by the writer Austin Bond in the shadow of the movie Bohemian Rhapsody, when it came out. A film that sought to celebrate the life and work of a great showman, but one which many people think controversially attributed the manner of his death to the manner of his life and not for the first time either. Anyone who watched the final act, the most recent BBC documentary commemorating 30 years since Freddie died, cannot help to have been moved by its content. Freddie, gone yet defiant, he sang till he could no longer stand. The gay plague, they called it. Freddie's got AIDS ran the red tops. You know, Presiding Officer, looking back, it's almost as if he rejoiced in the scandal of it all, without acknowledging the sadness or the tragedy of it all either. That is, of course, after they endlessly hounded him and those around him before he died, I don't need to name and shame them, they know who they are. Anyone who watched Russell T. Davis, it's a sin on channel 4, cannot help to have been moved by that either. As one of the six and a half million people in the UK who did watch it, I will make a confession, I could not and did not watch it till the end, I tried, because it made me sad, it made me angry and it made me sad again. So many young lives gone too soon, I still cannot watch documentaries about the AIDS crisis in the 1980s or 1990s, because many of the protagonists, young men and their friends, remind me of me and my friends, we were a couple of years too lucky, I think. It's really hard to believe it's been 40 years now since the first cases of HIV were discovered. It's hard to believe that that same prejudice still exists towards the virus today. It's hard to believe that we were able to find a vaccine for Covid-19 in less than a year, but not one for HIV in 40. It's hard to believe that one in 10 people living with HIV today still do not even know they have it. The story of HIV and AIDS is one of constant disbelief, which I think encompasses both the misery and the marvel of that story. The misery, the bigotry and let's be honest, the blatant homophobia that many suffered and those who died in the 80s, but many who still face that today. But also to the marvel, the marvels of the morning after pill, which launched in the mid-90s. It's called PEP, and it's no doubt prevented the inevitable infection of so many over the years. The marvel that you can now take a preventative pill each day, which stops you becoming positive upon exposure to HIV. That's called PEP, and more than four and a half thousand Scots have benefited from it. It's been a game changer, but it's also been dubbed the promiscuity pill by some of the tabloids. It seems that some things or indeed some people never change. Let's marvel at the fact that an HIV diagnosis today now means that you can live a long, happy, healthy life, and for some no longer even needing daily medication with the arrival of bi-monthly intravenous jabs, which have just been approved by the NHS in England and Scotland in the last couple of weeks. But let's talk about disbelief as well, although disbelief to many still that you cannot catch HIV from kissing or toilet seats or cutlery or by holding hands, and my own personal disbelief that we still have to say these things as a public message. Disbelief that those on the right medication with low or no viral load simply cannot transmit HIV. That's called U equals U, and if you don't know what it means, look it up. Disbelief that young people still use the word AIDS as a derogatory or insulting term. Disbelief that HIV-positive elderly people in care homes still face stigma and fear of disclosing their status. John Edie, we now identify as patient zero who died of AIDS when I was just one year old in 1981. We know his name, we know it now, but he was the first of many names, and I would list them all, but there are nearly 50 million of them, 33 million as a conservative estimate. That's an awful lot of names, and it would take me an awful long time to read them out, but perhaps today we can remember them, both those names known to us and those unknown. Let us be clear, HIV is not a gay disease, nor one of drug users, nor one which only affects people in sub-Saharan Africa. It can affect anyone, anywhere in the world, and we're not for role models, on TV shows, on chat shows or social media or even parliamentary debates if anybody watches those. Perhaps we would never talk about it in public. Gareth Thomas, Magic Johnson, Billy Porter and more locally, James Bush. James, whose groundbreaking fight for equality allows him to fulfil his dream to fly planes over our heads in Scotland, possibly even as we speak. They all came out, so to speak, about their HIV-positive status, bravely sharing their stories, but how many others had to disclose their status because of fear of being outed in the media or publicly or at work, and how many lost their jobs or lost their families or lost their medals or sadly lost their lives, unable to cope with a stigma. The first thing that we've all learned this year is the importance of knowing your status, getting tested for things, becoming normal, and knowing that when you do test, there's no shame in a positive diagnosis. Look, if we can all take three lateral flow tests a week to check for Covid-19, then surely you can get checked for HIV just once or maybe twice a year. It's not too much to ask. But also, vitally, it gives us a smidge of a chance to meet our ambitious targets of eliminating new cases of HIV by 2030. If you don't test, you don't know, and if you don't know, you can't get treatment, and if you're not on treatment, then yes, you can pass it on. Look, we've all been faced by the stark reality of epidemiology these past 19 months, so my message today should make more sense to more people than the last time I made a speech about this in this chamber. In closing, I will make one specific ask of the Government today. Sexual health services in Scotland are creaking at the seams. Some people used to go for quarterly check-ups or tests. They haven't been in nearly two years now. The phone lines are clogged, the appointments are few and far between, and that could mean that some people are going undiagnosed. There are 4,500 people in Scotland on PrEP. There are over 5,000 on HIV medication, and that is putting a huge amount of strain on those dedicated services. I'm afraid to say that many GPs have received little or no training on PrEP, on PEP, on HIV treatment. No least those in our rural areas, where stigma and I'm afraid ignorance anecdotally and regrettably are much higher. I'd like to thank colleagues today for joining me this evening and this debate, but let me make a very specific, direct, wider call there to the public or anyone who's watching or listening to this debate. One, know your status. Two, let's end the stigma. And three, please, please, go get tested. Thank you. Thank you very much indeed, Mr Greene. I now call on Paul McClennan, who will be followed by Craig Hoy around four minutes, Mr McClennan. Let's scoot the context of AIDS in the world today. There's 37.7 million people living with HIV in 2020. 680,000 people died from HIV-related causes in 2020, and there are 1.5 million people who were newly affected in 2020. The theme of this year's world age day is end equality and AIDS. Today, the World Health Organization is calling on global leaders and citizens to rally to confront the inequalities that drive AIDS and to reach people who are currently not receiving essential HIV services. With a special focus on reaching people left behind, the World Health Organization and its partners are highlighting the growing inequalities and access to essential HIV services. Division, disparity and disregard for human rights are among the failures that allowed HIV to become and remain a global health crisis. Covid-19 is exacerbating inequities and disruption to services, making the lives of many people living with HIV more challenging. Jamie Greene mentioned the name of John Edie. He was the first recorded AIDS victim to die in Britain. He remained a medical mystery since the day he died. He was never publicly named, and neither was a disease he died of. John died on 29 October 1981 at the Royal Brompton Hospital in Chelsea. His cause was recorded as pneumocystis pneumonia. The rare form of pneumonia would later be recognised as a deadly sign of HIV, but at the time John's death doctors didn't know what the underlying cause was of virus. Until now, the only trace of John's death was a brief entry in the Lancet medical journey in December 1981. I am quote, and it referred to John as being a known homosexual who travelled to Miami and was suspected to have died of the same mystery illness that was sweeping much of the gay community in America. That was a language in 1981. By tracing all the patients who died that year with the rare form of pneumonia, ITV was able to find John's death certificate and find the friends that nursed him in his final days who waited 40 years to confirm the mystery of his death. With their support, they were able to finally tell his story. Friends remember John as a charming man who ran a guest house in Bournemouth that was a haven for gay men to meet and drink in the late 1970s and 1980s. Again, that is back to the stigma around that time. That stigma led to many gay men being victimised in the late 1980s, as AIDS began devastating their community. Like most aged patients in the 1980s, by the time John was diagnosed, his life expectancy would have been just months or even weeks. Until recently, the first aged patient to be public identified in Britain was Terence Higgins, who died in 1982, willing his friends to set up a charity in his name. Four decades on from John AD's death, extraordinary advantages and drugs have dramatically reduced deaths. Today, there is no reason why anyone with HIV should not live a full life. The UK's goal is to cut new infections to zero by 2030, and that is to be commended. In the UK, what medicine has not cured, and Jamie Greene touched on this, is a stigma that still surrounds HIV in AIDS 40 years after the first death here. Much work is still to be done. Again, I commend Jamie for bringing this debate forward today. John AD will be remembered. Presiding Officer, in conclusion, across the world, AIDS is still killing 600,000 people a year, mostly in Africa, where access to drugs is far more limited. That is 600,000 John AD's every year, 600,000 people with their friends and families grieving for them. As I said earlier, the World Health Organization is calling on global leaders and citizens to rally to confront the inequalities that drive AIDS into people who are currently not receiving essential HIV services. On World AIDS Day, we must do more to inequalities and end AIDS. Presiding Officer, I would like to thank Jamie Greene for securing this debate today. World AIDS Day is a moment to pause and remember those who have died and those many thousands who continue to die of this preventable and treatable disease. However, it is also an opportunity to look forward with ambition and hope. In the mid-1990s, I moved to London as an undergraduate. The height of the pandemic had passed. The tombstone and the somber stark adverts had long since left their screens. The shocking and sad scenes that have recently brought back to life in the Russell T Davies series, It's a Sin, had faded from the nation's consciousness. Even then, in London in 1995, there were still young gay men falling ill. The friend or the friend of friends who you might not have seen for a while, who left testing and who left treatment too late. Like Patrick, who was in his late 40s, the life and soul of any party who was the first person to my knowledge that I knew who went on to die from an AIDS-related condition. The challenge today is to harness the progress made since young people like Patrick died, so we can finally eradicate HIV transmission once and for all. To achieve what campaigners and policymakers hope will be a world where people with HIV live healthy lives, with viral levels undetectable and where new cases are halted. I would like to pay tribute to the organisations who work in Scotland to make this a reality. We've only cared HIV Scotland, the Terence Against Trust and the National AIDS Trust among others. It is four decades since the first cases of HIV were diagnosed, since fear ran through high-risk communities before spreading right across continents, as we saw in Africa. The progress since then has been unimaginable, rapid testing, simple but effective antiretroviral treatments, PEP and PEP. People living normal lives, people who in the past would have fallen ill and died. However, while treatment is effective, we should still bear in mind that there is no vaccine for this virus and still no cure. We know that there is cross-party support, global support to end new cases of HIV over the next decade, and to do that, we need to maximise HIV diagnosis, as Jamie Greene said. People get access to the simple treatments that mean that they can live a normal life, often only taking one pill a day. As Jamie Greene highlighted, the arrival of Covid has brought a greater awareness and acceptance of testing. That is something that we should harness and make the focus of funding minister so that we take testing to the next level. To make testing an everyday norm, something in our homes and beyond, today in Scotland there are 5,122 people living with diagnosed HIV, but there are still an estimated 500 people living with the condition undiagnosed. Although the largest rate of infection, 47 per cent, resulted from men who have sex with men, 40 per cent of infections resulted from sex between men and women. We know that HIV does not discriminate between those who are gay, straight, bisexual or between men and women. I recall the night that a heterosexual friend told me that he had just been diagnosed with HIV. I gave him a hug and as his tears fell on my shoulder, he talked not of his fears about the treatment that he was about to begin, but he talked about how he was scared of the stigma that he thought he might face. Testing and treatment are still only two parts of the jigsaw. As Paul MacLennan rightly said, we must do more to remove the problem of prejudice if we are to continue to succeed against this virus. Let's be in no doubt. Success against HIV and AIDS is possible. Future transmission can be largely eradicated. I want to close by quoting Russell T. Davis, whose TV series recently reminded us of just how far we've come. Strange to think, he said, that it might come and go within my lifetime, that a virus can be a moment in history and no more. It's possible, he added, that one day HIV and AIDS might just be a memory, a story, like some old drama that was once on the TV. Deputy Presiding Officer, that should be our goal and it is within our grasp. Thank you very much indeed. I now call Paul Cain. He'll be followed by Maggie Chapman. Again, four minutes, Mr O'Cain. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I thank Jamie Greene for bringing this debate to the chamber as we mark World AIDS Day. Indeed, can I praise his very powerful speech? I also thank all organisations who work to support people living with HIV to improve sexual health and to advocate for more services in action to eradicate HIV AIDS, most notably the Terence Higgins Trust, Waverly Care, the National Age Trust and HIV Scotland. I thank them, indeed, for all of their helpful briefing information that they have provided ahead of our debate today and indeed the work that they do all through the year. As each world's AIDS Day is marked, I reflect on how far we've come, what we still have to do not only here in Scotland and the UK but also around the world, to meet our ambitious targets to end new HIV infections by 2030. I wish to begin this evening by remembering all those lost in the 40 years since the first diagnosed cases of HIV. We think of all those who have died, the pain and suffering caused for those who loved them, and the long-lasting impact of stigma and shame, which for too long has dominated our society. Growing up, I remember only too well that sense of fear that existed, that sense of othering people, particularly in the LGBT plus community, the view of many in the mainstream media and more broadly in society, the age with somehow about lifestyle choices or some kind of punishment for being gay. The lack of compassion, the refusal to seek to understand and the lack of support led to unimaginable circumstances for people and long-lasting poor mental health. When I look at my own adult life, I realise that I have been extremely fortunate in the support that is available now, particularly for LGBT plus people in terms of talking about these issues, seeking advice on safe sex, knowing your status and now, of course, having access to PEP and PEP. For people living with HIV, better support to live a full life and through advancements in medicine, reaching viral status undetectable, meaning that they are untransmittable and cannot pass a virus on. I think that we would all want to praise the U equals U campaign and the work done by charities in this area. I very much echo what Jamie Greene said that if you do not know what that is, then please do take time to look at it. It is important, I think, to look back, to acknowledge the pain and suffering of a whole generation, and we have heard already tonight that recent TV dramas have helped to do this very well. It is a sin on channel 4, very powerfully portrayed the darkest moments of the 1980s and the culture of fear and hate that was created. Pose on BBC iPlayer did similar, focusing particularly on the discrimination faced by transgender people decades ago. At the time of its sin, I tweeted and, as Jamie Greene said, it was a very difficult watch. What I said was that it made me laugh, it made me cry, it made me feel angry for a whole generation of people and that these stories must be heard, their lives remembered. We must also educate on how far we have come and what we still have to do, which brings me to what we still must do. Our world is different decades on. The advances are remarkable, but stigma persists. In 2019, a poll by the Terence Higgins Trust found that public attitudes on HIV remain stubbornly out of step with the scientific progress. 41 per cent of British adults believe that everyone living with HIV can pass on the virus. 64 per cent would feel uncomfortable having sex with someone living with HIV who is on effective treatment. Almost half would feel uncomfortable kissing someone living with HIV despite there being no risk of transmission. 38 per cent of people would feel uncomfortable with going on a date with someone who is HIV positive. We also have more to do to achieve our target of no new infections by 2030. Indeed, organisations such as the Terence Higgins Trust have said that we need a step change in order to make this a reality. I know that the minister in closing will want to provide an update on the development of the Scottish Government's work to end new HIV transmissions within the decade, and what considerations have been made, particularly about expanding the access of PrEP into other healthcare settings and other actions that we can take to reach the target. In concluding, I am proud to have been able to contribute to this debate, to remember the dead, to fight for the living and to strive to a world without new transmissions. I thank Jamie Greene for securing this debate this evening on the 33rd anniversary of World AIDS Day, the first international health day. Thanks to all the organisations and individuals who do such important work supporting and caring for people living with HIV and their family and friends, raising awareness about HIV AIDS and working to bust the myths around this disease. I would also like to send my condolences to all those who have lost a loved one or more than one to this disease or to the stigma and bigotry associated with it. It is just a little over 40 years that, when the CDC in the US published a report on the deaths of five previously healthy gay men aged 29 to 36 that marked the beginning of the recognition of AIDS, a few months later, as we have heard already this evening, the UK reported patient zero's death. In the intervening years, somewhere between 33 and 50 million lives have been lost, probably more given poor diagnosis in many parts of the world over those last 40 years. Others in this chamber have spoken movingly and powerfully about the situation in Scotland and the UK and the work that's needed to do if we are to achieve the 2030 target for zero HIV infections. I want, if I may, to speak a little bit about some of the more global issues that this virus has presented us with. As we are reminded daily, none of us is safe until all of us are safe. The global story of HIV AIDS is multifaceted. Grief and loss are intertwined with activism and rage. Scientific triumph is mixed with futility and resistance and resilience. A thread of suffering still, sadly, runs through the story, and underpinning all of this are fundamental questions about equity, discrimination, stigma and justice. I speak of scientific triumph. In 1996, when the results of the first successful trials of the triple drug antiretroviral therapy that worked were presented at the international AIDS conference in Vancouver, hope and relief spread across the world like wildfire. I remember the news stories in Zimbabwe. There was a treatment that would save people's lives, but it became very clear very quickly that the HIV patients on ART were in high-income countries, and most people living with HIV were in low-income and middle-income countries. The period between 1996 and 2003 saw the peak of AIDS related deaths, with Sub-Saharan Africa being the worst affected region of the world. AIDS care was costly. People with money might survive. People without would die. Of course, things like the AIDS denialism of Tabou Mbeki's Government in South Africa did not help, but that people's life chances depended on geography and wealth was and is morally and ethically unacceptable. Action was needed. In 2003, George Bush announced his emergency plan for AIDS relief. With that and along with the creation of the global fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in 2005, the needed billions began to flow. Political campaigns were the cost of ART plummet from tens of thousands of dollars a year per treatment to less than $100 per year. Death rates declined, mother-to-child transmission slowed, new and better drugs, more preventative tools were developed, thanks to massive public sector investment. Those same HIV research networks and trial sites proved instrumental in Covid vaccine development last year. Yet, today, the global pandemic continues. Parts of Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa are seeing increasing infection rates, the absence of life-saving, life-extending antiretroviral therapies. That means deaths, needless deaths, continue to mount up. HIV is increasingly an infection of more marginalised communities. Poor people, sex workers, men who have sex with men, transgender people, people who inject drugs, adolescence and prisoners and detainees. Stigma and prejudice live on, and Covid-19 has only exacerbated those challenges. In closing, we need to recognise the value of what we learned in the 80s and 90s, the value of sustained investment in science. We must also recognise the importance, too, of global solidarity, of activism, of advocacy. That is why today and this debate are so important. Welcome to the debate on World AIDS Day, which this year has the theme of end inequalities, end AIDS and end pandemics. I congratulate Jamie Greene on securing it and commend Jamie's contribution this evening. I led the debate in 2019 and I am pleased to continue my support for World AIDS Day and the opportunity it presents to continue to raise awareness of 40 years on since the emergence of HIV and AIDS. I encourage all to access the Waverly Care and HIV Scotland websites to learn about their work, including generation zero campaign by HIV Scotland. I cannot stress enough how important it is to get the message across to everyone that, once a person has received a diagnosis, receives appropriate treatment and becomes undetectable in their viral load of the HIV virus, they cannot pass on the virus through sexual transmission. Waverly Care, along with NHS boards across Scotland, are doing important work to promote the importance of being of people knowing their HIV status as well as to promote the undetectable equals untransmissible U equals U message. When preparing for this debate, I reflected on my working time at Cedars-Lion Am Medical Centre in the heart of West Hollywood in Los Angeles in the early 90s. I was there in LA when Magic Johnson was diagnosed. It was huge news at the time. The stigma associated with HIV and AIDS was so absolutely evident back then. I recall how people who were HIV positive or who had AIDS were affected negatively by attitudes of the public, but also healthcare professionals who should have known better. It was very distressing for the people and their families in truly stigmatising. I am glad that we have moved on since then. I have also reflected on the time of the lives that have been lost and the people that I have known who have lost their lives too. My condolences go out to all as well. LGBT Scotland and Stonewall and even the recent Channel 4 show, which others have mentioned, have had a huge impact on tackling the stigma and its welcome. Scotland is leading the way in the fight against HIV and AIDS. When I led the debate in 2019, I spoke about the progress that was made in Scotland to meet the United Nations 1990 targets. The UN stated that by 2020, 90 per cent of people living with HIV would be diagnosed, 90 per cent would be diagnosed—who were diagnosed would be receiving treatment—and 90 per cent would have an undetectable viral load. Despite the pressures caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, Scotland has met those targets. 91 per cent of the people are now diagnosed, 98 per cent are receiving treatment and 94 per cent have an undetectable viral load. I paid tribute to the NHS Scotland staff such as NHS, D&G, sexual health and blood-borne virus nurse, Mary Murray, who had just received her nurse consultant post for her work. Today, in Scotland, HIV is considered a manageable long-term health condition with treatments such as PREP that allows people to live long and healthy lives. On PREP and other HIV and AIDS treatments, it is extremely reckless. I think that the UK Government has cut UN AIDS funding by 83 per cent. A recent international development select committee report laid bare the devastating impact that these cuts are having on the global fight against HIV, saying that the cut would reverse decades of hard-won progress in cutting transmission rates and death rates. Today, on World AIDS Day, I am repeating the SNP calls on Boris Johnson's Government to reverse the cuts to UK funding for crucial AIDS and HIV treatment as we continue to battle this other deadly pandemic. Finally, testing has a central role to play in reducing the number of new infections, particularly by helping to reduce the proportion of HIV cases that are undiagnosed. Testing is as simple as a finger prick blood sample and results are known immediately. My ask of the Scottish Government is not to take the foot off the pedal and to continue public awareness campaigns on the importance of sexual health tests, including for HIV and AIDS. I again welcome this debate and the progress that has been made so far, and I commend Jamie Greene for bringing it to Parliament this evening. Thank you, Ms Harper. I now call the final speaker in the open debate, Stephen Kerr, again, around four minutes, please. Thank you, Dyrdiw of Science. I must confess that I felt dismayed listening to Emma Harper's speech, because I think that this is an occasion where we should all come together and speak with one voice about things that are of the utmost importance. I congratulate Jamie Greene, my colleague and friend, for bringing this motion forward today, and I thank everyone who has supported him in this debate. There is a time in every person's life when they are presented with a situation of anxiety. It could be when you are waiting for the first scan in a difficult pregnancy or when you are faced with the loss of your job or you are told that a loved one has a terminal illness. There are a few situations, Deputy Presiding Officer, which raise as much anxiety as when one is waiting for a medical diagnosis. It is a scenario and a situation that many of us and our fellow citizens go through. It is made more bearable with the understanding of your family and the people around you, your friends who will stand by you, those who love you. Nobody should face a diagnosis alone. For far too many people, they face an HIV diagnosis and feel very alone. They are left feeling stigmatised by the diagnosis. Whether through other people's ignorance or through their own sense of regret, they hide away. It is worth reflecting, as Paul O'Kane rightly indicated. That feeling of stigma can still remain for those who have received the viral status undetectable, as mentioned in the motion. Despite what my friend Jamie Greene rightly describes in his motion as huge advancements in medicine, there is still a lot of evidence of stigma for those who are HIV positive. Too often, they feel alone. That drives a sense of abandonment, isolation and depression. We must be sensitive to the mental wellbeing of those who have been diagnosed with HIV. We must do all that we can to support them and to help them. They need us to stand alongside them with support and compassion. As we move towards the target of no transmission by 2030, which the Scottish Government set last year, we must be increasingly sensitive to those who have HIV and how we can support them. Yes, through the treatments available, but also in terms of the support that they need as people rather than as cases. I would like to know what specific plans the minister has for mental health support as we move towards the 2030 target and how the Government plans to ensure that we do not leave HIV positive people behind as we focus more of our efforts on prevention. The target of removing transmission is an ambitious one, but one that medical technology and better information makes eminently possible. The reduction in infection rates as a result of PrEP, as well as treatments to allow people to live with the virus undetectable, already shows what can be achieved. Yet, we must always have a care to never leave anyone behind. They are the ones who have lived and continue to live with HIV. They need our compassion and our understanding and our support, but perhaps more than anything else, they need our love. Thank you very much, Mr Kerr. I now call Marie Todd to respond to the debate minister around seven minutes, please. Thank you, Deputy Chief Presiding Officer, and thank you to Jamie Greene for bringing this important matter to the chamber. I'm struck by the many thoughtful contributions that we've heard today. Let me begin by paying tribute to everyone who has lost their lives to ages-related illness over the past four decades. It has taken too many people, and I know that the pain of that loss continues to be felt by many in Scotland today, and my heart goes out to them. I hope that we honour those losses with the progress that we've made and will continue to make in tackling HIV and AIDS. While the losses can never and should never be forgotten, a diagnosis of HIV is no longer a death sentence. In most cases, it's a manageable condition and it doesn't prevent people from living full, healthy and happy lives. For anyone who remembers the darkest days of the pandemic, that fact still seems remarkable. I have to say that when I was studying for my pharmacy degree in the early 90s and learning about what was then a relatively new virus and the new drugs that were coming in to treat it, I have to pinch myself when I think about how far we've come. So, this afternoon, I want to acknowledge the work over the last four decades that's got us to this point. I am incredibly grateful to everyone who has fought with such passion and dedication. We should all be incredibly proud of the strides taken to detect and treat HIV around the world, including here in Scotland. In 2017, Scotland was one of the first countries in the world to introduce an HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, offering free preventative medication to those who were deemed at the highest risk of acquiring HIV. To date, over 4,000 people have had preps prescribed at least once, and we've seen significant reductions in new diagnosis of HIV amongst gay and bisexual men in the four years since it was launched. Preps isn't the only good news story. In October this year, I was absolutely delighted to see that Scotland had become the first country in the UK to authorise an injection to manage HIV. That could make a huge difference to people with HIV by giving them a choice about the treatment that's right for them. However, while we've come far, I know our work is not yet done, and that's why this Government committed in its manifesto last year to eliminate HIV transmission by 2030. That, of course, is a challenge, particularly as we emerge from another pandemic that has taken a huge toll on our communities, our people and our health services. However, I am in absolutely no doubt that, with the same collective purpose that has transformed HIV treatment in the past four decades, we can reach this next goal. In the coming weeks, we'll take an important step towards it. Dr Raq Nandwani will begin his work as chair of the Scottish Government's HIV transmission elimination oversight group. Its members include clinicians, academics, public health experts, third sector representatives and people living with HIV. It will develop and test a proposal for how we can eliminate HIV transmission. Due to being published in late 2022, the proposal will contain advice on issues such as target setting, outcomes, definitions and building links right across the system to support diagnosis and treatment. I'll just answer my point that was raised during the debate. It will also consider options for widening access to PrEP across Scotland. It's great to hear the advancements that we're making on the medical side of things, but something that I've heard a lot tonight is about the stigma. How do we break that stigma and try to educate people better so that people are not in danger to others when they have HIV? I think that this is a significant and important debate in tackling the stigma, in setting out that HIV is a condition that people live with now and that the disease can be driven down to such a level that it's not a risk to anyone who is no longer a transmissible risk. I recognise that meeting the 2030 target will require concerted and focused effort. We have to act quickly, but we will only succeed with careful planning and taking our time now will increase our chances of success in the long term. I'm very grateful to Dr Nandrani and the members for taking on this work and I look forward to being able to provide future updates on the progress. Before I conclude, I must also acknowledge the continued progress hinges on the existence of resilient sexual health and blood-borne viruses services, another point that was raised during the debate. We've recently published a reset and rebuild, a recovery plan for sexual health, blood-borne virus services to address the impact of Covid-19 and to identify recovery priorities. To support that, the Scottish Government's already provided almost £900,000 this year to third sector organisations and we're in the process of allocating additional funding to support specific recovery actions focused on testing, HIV and hepsis elimination. To further support this work, along with other key priorities, we're beginning work to reinvigorate the framework on sexual health and blood-borne viruses. This has guided our work for 10 years and it's been a vital tool, but it's really important that we take stock of where we are and update it so that it reflects current challenges and priorities. I can give you the time back, minister. Jamie Greene. I do appreciate the minister's forbearance, but it's an important point that I wanted to make. The point that I made is that we know that those sexual health services are extremely busy and that's partially due to the introduction of things like PREP and being victims of our own success. I congratulate the Government for that. It's been a game changer. However, they are pushed to the limits and the problem is that many people, especially in rural communities, don't feel comfortable or able to go to their GPs or pharmacists or elsewhere for those services. If we only deliver them in those centralised environments, then they're people waiting a very, very long time. That's something that we need to address now. We don't have time to wait. I think that it's a very valid point. One of the things that I would say is that some of the ways that we've changed our access to healthcare over the course of this current pandemic will certainly be useful in widening access and reducing the stigma of accessing these specialist services in the future. If I think about the potential for using technologies like near me and the potential for being able to access this type of support in your local community pharmacy, all of those are likely to offer a real way forward. In the next few months, we're going to accelerate the work to achieve the new framework and the framework refresh in co-production with the third sector, clinicians and academics, to ensure that we're considering all the issues and challenges in a systemic and holistic way. Updating the framework has to be collaborative. Now, more than ever, it has to be a framework capable of delivering real change. That means listening to those who best understand what change is needed. I am confident that, if we succeed, the framework, too, will play a vital role in helping us to achieve our 2030 target for HIV transmission elimination. I once again extend my sincere thanks to all those who have achieved so much over the past 40 years. The AIDS epidemic exacted a tremendous cost, but I am continually humbled by the strength of those who did not give up and fought for a better future. I commit today to continuing in that spirit and to working towards a future where HIV transmission is eliminated in Scotland. Thank you very much indeed Minister. That concludes the debate, and I close this meeting of Parliament.