This speech was delivered on 29 November at World AIDS Day reception at Downing Street. 

Prime Minister, your country saved my life. 

I was diagnosed with HIV aged 36 on a family visit to the UK, from Zimbabwe. I was an IT manager for a Southern African regional NGO. I thought I had a cold, but my aunt suggested an HIV test. I had a CD4 cell count of six and a very high viral load. What that means is I essentially had no white blood cells. I had AIDS.

My life fell apart. But thanks to this country, to the NHS, to the government then 22 years ago, I am well. I was made strong through peer support. I take a couple of pills a day for my HIV.

I have the best HIV care. I can’t pass HIV on.

Actually, it is my other comorbidities that have a greater impact on my life. I am a kidney transplant patient and was diagnosed with breast cancer this year, but I am still living well. 

I am a treatment advocate with the UK-CAB, and a peer mentor for Positively UK. I have met friends through living with HIV and we have written a book together called Our Stories Told By Us: The African Contribution to the UK HIV response. We are so grateful to Winnie Byanyima, who wrote the foreword for us and is here this evening. 

I am a proud woman living with HIV but Prime Minister, that doesn’t mean my journey has been easy. I often ask myself, why wasn’t I tested earlier? In a parallel world, I would have known about PrEP, or been able to access 6-monthly injectable prevention. This now exists, it’s called lenacapavir, but we can’t access it yet. 

Why, still, does our health service so often perpetuate the stigma we experience? I often think about my peers who are not so lucky, for whom the stigma and their other struggles means they don’t access treatment, and fall out of care. Why can’t my GP and other consultants talk to each other? Why are the charities that support people like me always fighting to stay afloat? 

That is why I stand here now as somebody who fights for better lives for people living with HIV and also for a future where no one else receives an HIV diagnosis. What unites us all here is the will to make that happen. All of it is possible because politicians have listened to people like me and things have changed.

So while I have a long list of things I could ask you this evening Prime Minister, I really only have one ask of you today: that is that when the papers on HIV cross your desk, you take out your pen and you give it a big green tick. Because knowing that the Prime Minister stands with us matters. It sends a message, to the civil servants here, to the Ministers here, to the MPs here, to my community – that this is a priority for the government. 

Ending new HIV transmissions in the UK is within our grasp. Your leadership makes all the difference. So over to you Prime Minister.

Memory Sachikonye is the Admin and Finance Lead at PosUK. She is also a peer mentor. She coordinates the UK-CAB, a network of HIV treatment advocates.