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Current research being done by the UCLA AIDS Institute to address the problem of AIDS in Africa will be presented at a symposium today in Kaufman Hall.

The program will consist of three panel discussions, dance performances, films and keynote speaker Stephen Lewis, U.N. special envoy of HIV/AIDS in Africa. Panelist members will include experts on the spread and prevention of HIV/AIDS from around the world, including the former vice president of Uganda, Speciaosa Wandira Kazibwe.

“As you can see we’ve made an effort to not just talk about Africa, but have people from Africa talk about Africa,” said Dr. Thomas Coates, one of four co-chairs of the event. “There are people here that we’ve brought from Africa who will take this information back with them and apply it.”

Coates, the person who developed the idea for the symposium, also said, “The whole mission of this is really to highlight the solutions in HIV prevention and care by bringing together public health, medicine, arts and media.”

The symposium will highlight current research being done by faculty at both UCLA and the Charles R. Drew University of Los Angeles to address the prevention, spread and cure of AIDS within Africa.

“We’d like to make the UCLA community aware of some of the research that is ongoing in Africa involving faculty, and associates of both universities. Our goals are to present what research is being done, to network, to interest donors to help us establish a formal collaboration between groups at UCLA that are interested in addressing the problem, and to integrate art and music,” said Dr. Gail Wyatt, co-chair of the event and professor in residence at UCLA.

“We don’t want to perpetuate the pattern of uninvolvement that the American government has taken. We would like to take action now,” she added.

The incorporation of arts and music as a communicative aspect to stemming the tide of AIDS will be an important aspect of the symposium, which will include a dance performances by UCLA PhD Candidate, Peter Carpenter, and Idi Saaka, UCLA MFA Candidate, and the presentation of a visual arts gallery and the film, “Vulnerability to AIDS, TB, and Malaria: The Role of Poverty.”

“I wanted to make a case for the role of artists in stopping AIDS. Artists are excellent communicators through film, dances and theaters,” said David Gere, associate professor of World Arts and Culture and co-chair of the symposium.

“We are committed to building partnerships in Africa. Our idea is to create a network so people across disciplines can tackle the problem,” said Dr. Irvin Chen, director of the UCLA AIDS Institute. “We are very committed to translational studies and cross-disciplinary programs. We have people doing epidemiological care, behavioral research and people turning art into preventional messages.”

Chen added that the institute planned on presenting the AIDS in Africa symposium annually, and adding AIDS in India and AIDS in Asia programs in the future.

“Ten thousand people die every 10 days from AIDS,” Chen said. “The viral waves that are sweeping across Africa and Asia are invisible and work over decades.”