About PrEPnu

PrEP­nu has always wel­comed coop­er­a­tion, and is will­ing to coop­er­ate with any­one, but we will also not be slowed down or stopped by any­one. We part­ner with orga­ni­za­tions such as Aids Health Foun­da­tion, GGD’s, COC, Hiv Verenig­ing, Aids­fonds and Soa Aids Ned­er­land, both in lob­by­ing and orga­ni­za­tion­al aspects.

Since 2015, we have col­lab­o­rat­ed with a group of orga­ni­za­tions and experts from the field of HIV experts who have been unit­ed in the “PrE­Pared” lob­by group. Work­ing togeth­er with this group, we have tried and are still try­ing to encour­age politi­cians to offer PrEP with the low­est pos­si­ble bar­ri­ers. The results of these efforts vary (“Brief Bruins”).

When the Dutch gov­ern­ment decid­ed to seek advice from the Health Coun­cil in June 2017 before mak­ing a pol­i­cy deci­sion, we spoke to the advi­so­ry com­mis­sion to clar­i­fy our views, togeth­er with Hiv Verenig­ing, Aids­fonds and COC. The Health Council’s advice to the min­is­ter can be found here.

Nation­al pol­i­tics turned out to be pret­ty reluc­tant about PrEP. Motions from D66 and Groen­Links ask­ing to make PrEP avail­able as soon as pos­si­ble often depend­ed on sup­port from the VVD, who then did not vote to sup­port the motions. Sources told us that many mem­bers of par­lia­ment still have a lot of bias when it comes to gay sex (even though PrEP is not only about gay sex). A peti­tion from PrEP­nu with 4349 sig­na­tures did not change this.

We achieved a small vic­to­ry when the Ams­ter­dam City Coun­cil decid­ed in July 2017 to make extra funds avail­able to broad­en the GGD Amsterdam’s InPrEP pro­gram. PrEPnu’s opin­ion was heard in the city coun­cil when the motion was put for­ward there (again by D66 and GroenLinks).

PrEP­nu has always been promi­nent­ly fea­tured in debates about PrEP, such as the debate PrEP TALK in De Balie in Sep­tem­ber 2016, and the PrEP Deba­cle in Feb­ru­ary 2017 in Club Church.

PrEP­nu is also involved with We Are PrE­Pared, a work­ing group of GGDs, fam­i­ly doc­tors, Soa Aids Ned­er­land and PrEP experts, who try to imple­ment the intro­duc­tion of eas­i­ly avail­able PrEP and PrEP-relat­ed care accord­ing to the Brief Bru­ins in the third quar­ter of 2019.

PrEP­nu has par­tic­i­pat­ed twice in the Ams­ter­dam Canal Pride. In 2016, we were on a boat togeth­er with Poz & Proud, the gay men’s sec­tion of the HIV verenig­ing; and in 2018 we had our own boat. PrEP­nu has also par­tic­i­pat­ed three times in the Pride Walk, the tra­di­tion­al open­ing of Ams­ter­dam Pride. Well known drag queen Jen­nifer Hopelezz (also a mem­ber of PrEP­nu) was one of the ambas­sadors for Ams­ter­dam Pride 2018, and used her ambas­sador­ship to put and keep PrEP on the map.

PrEP­nu had a big suc­cess in talk­ing to phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies and phar­ma­cies in 2017 about PrEP, result­ed in a price reduc­tion for PrEP.