Youth activist Dany Stolbunov is outspoken about the need to end discrimination against people living with HIV. Photo © UNICEF/Anastasia Vlasova
Dany Stolbunov, now 20, admired and trusted his doctor in Ukraine enough to confide in him that he wanted to go to medical school. He hoped for affirmation of his dreams. Instead, he met rejection. “You can’t be a doctor,” his doctor said. “You have HIV.”
Born with HIV, Stolbunov learned he had the virus at age 8, when his father died of AIDS. As he grew up, he saw first-hand the stigma that still persists around HIV and AIDS even among people in health-care systems who are supposed to be on the front lines of treatment. As a young adult, he became determined to advocate for less discriminatory care. Read More
