As the new year approaches, so do leadership and structural changes at PrEP4All, the advocacy group best known for promoting universal access to pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, the daily pills and long-acting injections that prevent people from getting HIV.
Jeremiah Johnson, an HIV advocate since his own diagnosis in 2008, will helm the group as its acting executive director. Helping him lead during the time of transition at PrEP4All will be longtime AIDS and gay rights activist Peter Staley, who is stepping in as board chair, according to a PrEP4All statement.
This means that cofounder James Krellenstein and managing director Kenyon Farrow will not remain at the organization. In December, Farrow will begin tenure as the vice president of policy at Point Source Youth, which addresses the issue of youth homelessness.
Johnson received his master’s degree in public health from Columbia University in 2013 and previously served as director of Treatment Action Group’s HIV Project. Johnson appeared on the cover of the July/August 2008 issue of POZ. At the time, he had been serving as a Peace Corps volunteer when he was sent home after testing HIV positive while in Ukraine. With the help of the ACLU, he fought back, and the Peace Corps agreed to stop automatically terminating the employment of those who contracted HIV (to read that story, click “Service Interruptus.”)
Jeremiah Johnson on the cover of POZ, July/August 2008
Staley is a well-known activist from the early days of ACT UP New York who was a founding director of Treatment Action Group. Staley has appeared on the cover of POZ numerous times, most recently for the March 2022 issue, which included an excerpt from his memoir, Never Silent.
Peter Staley on the cover of POZ, March 2022
In addition to fighting for access to PrEP, the group has been active in molding the U.S. response to COVID-19 and mpox (the new preferred name for monkeypox). About the upcoming transitions, the PrEP4All statement begins:
Founded in 2018…the organization has dedicated itself to using evidence, activism and a deep commitment to patient-led movements to change government responses to and investments in pandemics. This commitment remains at the core of PrEP4All’s work and programmatic direction. In 2023, we will continue to lead the fight for a national PrEP program, move forward from the recent movement-building PrEP in Black America Summit, and provide rigorous advocacy analysis and strategy to the agenda for U.S. government accountability in pandemic preparedness and response.
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“In 2018, PrEP4All’s cofounders created the organization with a clear vision for a national PrEP program, forever changing the dialog on what equitable HIV prevention access should look like,” Johnson said in the group’s statement. “Over the past year, I and my fellow PrEP4All teammates have led the charge in a national movement for a PrEP program. With victory in sight, now is the time to accelerate that advocacy, and we will not stop fighting until we have a program in place that truly centers equity from conception, to funding, to implementation.”
For related articles, click #PrEP and #PrEP4All. You’ll find headlines such as:
- “Black HIV Advocates Plan Summit to Address PrEP Disparities,”
- “WATCH: Monkeypox Activists Disrupt AIDS2022 With Rageful Protest,”
- “Over 100 HIV Groups Urge Congress to Fund a PrEP Program” and
- “New Twist in the Gilead Patent Lawsuit Over Truvada and Descovy to Prevent HIV.”
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