Eastern European Media Partnership Launches HIV/AIDS Awareness Campaign

Media executives from Russia, Ukraine and other former Soviet republics on Wednesday announced a $30 million HIV/AIDS public awareness campaign and "urged" governments in the region to "do more to fight the exploding epidemic," the Associated Press reports (Danilova, Associated Press, 10/27). The executives met at the first Eurasia Media Leaders Summit on HIV/AIDS in Moscow. The meeting was organized by Transatlantic Partners Against AIDS, Gazprom-Media and the Global Media AIDS Initiative -- a joint program of UNAIDS, the Kaiser Family Foundation and the United Nations Department of Public Information (TPAA/GMAI release, 10/27). Joined by actor Richard Gere, representatives from television and radio networks and publishing companies announced that they would launch the public awareness campaign on Nov. 29. Gere said that he and Russian musician Andrei Makarevich will initiate a second campaign to assemble a "creative task force" to promote safer sex practices among people in the region, the Associated Press reports. According to Alexander Dybal, chair of the Russian Media Partnership Against HIV/AIDS, several television networks in Russia will begin to air public service announcements during prime-time programs (Associated Press, 10/27). To date, partners have pledged more than $30 million in commercial airtime for the first year of campaign PSAs and longer-format programming, including prime-time television coverage on Russian national networks, including NTV, STS and TNT (TPAA/GMAI release, 10/27). The campaign also will include programs targeting schools and training programs for journalists (Dzutsev, Moscow Times, 10/28). "Schools must be open for public awareness campaigns. ... This must be a state policy," Rafael Akopov, head of Prof-Media publishing house, said (Associated Press, 10/27).