In this article I am for once going to be a bit more serious than I have of late. Why serious? Well simply because I believe the above is a serious issue and with that in mind, I set out to get an interview with Cha Cha Biedermann who heads an HIV/AIDS support group here in SL.Many of you out there in SL may not be aware that Cha Cha’s group is now open to new members and that she is seeking to provide a community support team for anyone who needs help with HIV and AIDS. When I asked Cha Cha what she hoped to achieve, she replied that the group hadn’t had much in the way of PR and not surprisingly, she brought up the subject of sex in SL.
‘A lot of people think SL is just about sex. But that just isn’t true. What people don’t realise is that there are Support groups including my own that are specifically there to help. You could be out there feeling alone and isolated with this disease, we need people to know that we are here.’
I asked Cha Cha what she hopes to achieve and she told me that the group was primarily formed for HIV positive people who wanted to network and fight the disease together. The group also offers facilities like, access to scientists at Health Information Island and access to professionals who are there to offer information and counselling on the disease.
Cha Cha told me that a lot of Health projects are moving into SL and that more will follow, she pointed out that CDC, the Centre For Disease control and an official project of the USA, have opened an island recently and they have already interviewed Cha Cha and expressed an interest in her work to date.
Cha Cha pointed out that she is available for counselling and that her group would also like to extend the hand of friendship to would be members. Cha Cha also assured me that she maintains the utmost levels of confidentiality between avatars, even though to a certain extent SL already offers a certain degree of anonymity. She also pointed out that to date; she personally felt that the time had come to utilise the internet in the fight against AIDS. ‘There are no big projects on the Internet for positives within the international community. If people have questions or simply feel bad, they may feel they have nowhere to go, I want to put that right.’
I asked her if she thought SL was the answer and she pointed out that the availability of specialist health experts in SL is growing all the time.
I wished her luck with the group and joined myself to show my solidarity with her. Anyone who wishes to join the group should type AIDS and HIV Support into their ‘group’ search engine, or alternatively, you could send a message directly to Cha Cha by simply entering her name under ‘people’ in the search engine.
If you have HIV/AIDs or you have any questions regarding the disease, I am sure that Cha Cha would be glad to help you.
Article Contributed by Amelia Lutrova
