The International AIDS Society (IAS) today opens nominations for the 2024 AIDS Prudence Mabele Prize.
As of today, anyone can nominate a woman who is making a difference at the intersection of the HIV response, feminism, and gender and reproductive justice.
The Prudence Mabele Prize is a $25,000 endowment named in honor of the life and work of Prudence Mabele, a trailblazing activist for the rights of women and people living with HIV.
In 1992, she became the first Black woman to publicly reveal her HIV-positive status in South Africa. She was a founding member of the Treatment Action Campaign and founder of the Positive Women’s Network.
IAS – the International AIDS Society – created this prize in 2018 in partnership with the Positive Women’s Network of South Africa through an endowment from the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations. The prize carries the largest monetary value awarded at the International AIDS Conference.
The selected honoree will be a woman whose work and personal commitment best embodies the values, spirit and activism of Prudence Mabele.
The IAS has been at the center of the HIV response from the very start of the pandemic.
Nominations are accepted until 15 April, according to IAS.
Consideration will be based on the following criteria:
– Nominations are invited for women (cis and trans) making deep connections between the response to HIV, feminism and gender and reproductive justice.
– While we encourage applications from around the world, strong consideration will be given to applicants from the region where the conference is hosted.
– To honor and commemorate Prudence’s early activism and the courage she showed as a young woman openly speaking about her HIV-positive status, preference will also be given to applications from young people (under the age of 35, according to the definition in the African Youth Charter).
Potential recipients should match the values that Prudence embodied:
1- Innovativeness: Demonstrate the creativity of the nominee in their work, in line with the innovation Prudence showed throughout her life.
2- Perseverance: Illustrate the tenacity of the nominee in achieving their accomplishments.
3- Social justice: Exemplify how the nominee enhances social justice in both their work and personal life, with an emphasis on gender activism and vulnerable people.