World AIDS Day 2025: Defining Your Role in Ending AIDS
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World AIDS Day 2025: Defining Your Role in Ending AIDS
December 1, 2025 @ 5:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Presented by Pride at Work Canada
Hosted by Norton Rose Fulbright | Toronto | December 1, 2025
More than four decades after the first public accounts of AIDS, the fight is far from over. World AIDS Day 2025 calls on all of us to rethink, rebuild, and rise – with effective policy making, a commitment to innovation, and strong collaboration. Despite extraordinary scientific progress, new HIV infections in Canada have risen by 15% since 2020, and thousands remain undiagnosed. Around the world, funding cuts and waning political will threaten to undo decades of hard-won gains.
At this Toronto event, hosted by Norton Rose Fulbright, Pride at Work Canada brings together leaders from the front lines of the HIV response—municipal, national, and international—for an unflinching conversation about what it will take to end AIDS in our lifetime. Attendees will explore how communities are stepping up where governments and donors have stepped back, and how queer professionals can use their voices, networks, and workplaces to drive real change.
In 1981, Bobbi Campbell, the world’s first “AIDS poster boy,” risked everything to speak publicly about his diagnosis. “The more I talked about it,” he said, “the better it would be for me and my community.” His courage and candour sparked a movement rooted in truth-telling, solidarity, and mutual care. It’s a legacy that must guide us again today.
World AIDS Day 2025: Defining Your Role in Ending AIDS is your opportunity to define how you will contribute to ending AIDS. Join us to get real about where we stand, who is being left behind, and how we can rethink, rebuild, and rise together.
Schedule
- Panel: 5:30 PM to 6:30 PM
- Reception: 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM
Panel & Reception will take place at Norton Rose Fulbright (222 Bay St., Suite 3000, Toronto, ON M5K 1E7).
Panelists
Meg French (she/her)
Executive Director, Stephen Lewis Foundation
Meg is a passionate human rights advocate, with a deep commitment to social justice. She is currently the Executive Director of the Stephen Lewis Foundation, a dynamic, collaborative, feminist organization with an unwavering commitment to supporting grassroots organizations across Africa in countries hardest hit by the HIV epidemic. Before joining the Stephen Lewis Foundation, Meg worked with UNICEF, the United Nations Children Fund, for 17 years to protect and promote children’s rights. Most recently she was based in Geneva, leading the organization’s global campaign to improve maternal and newborn health. Prior to UNICEF, Meg was a high school teacher in Canada and the Marshall Islands.
About the Stephen Lewis Foundation: The Stephen Lewis Foundation is a progressive, feminist organization rooted in the principles of social justice, international solidarity, and substantive equality. The SLF was created with the express purpose of supporting community-led organizations working on the frontlines of the HIV epidemic in countries across Africa. Learn more about their work.
Jad Sinno (they/them)
Research Director, CBRC
Jad Sinno is the Director of Research at the Community Based Research Center and a Banting Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto. They are a queer, non-binary, Shami Arab who immigrated to Canada in 2004. Jad is a critical mixed methodologist with expertise in the social and cultural determinants of health for queer populations, including mental and sexual health care and human-computer interactions.
About CBRC: Since 1999, Community-Based Research Centre (CBRC) promotes the health of people of diverse sexualities and genders through research and intervention development. CBRC’s core pillars – community-led research, knowledge exchange, network building, and leadership development – position the organization as a thought leader, transforming ideas into actions that make a difference in our communities. Learn more about their work.
Carol Thames (she/they)
Executive Director, Fife House
Ms. Thames has more than 15 years of progressive leadership experience in the non-profit sector, grounded in a deep commitment to the very communities Fife House serves. Her career has been defined by work at the intersection of HIV/AIDS, mental health, addiction, homelessness, and 2SLGBTQIA+ inclusion: areas that speak directly to the mission and the lived realities of the people that Fife House supports every day.
Ms. Thames has a Master of Laws from Osgoode Hall Law School and a Master of Public Policy, Administration and Law from York University, with an equally impressive record of advocacy, service delivery, and strategic leadership across the not-for-profit sector.
About Fife House: Founded in 1988, Fife House is an innovative, client-focused provider of secure and supportive affordable housing and support services to people and families living with HIV/AIDS in the Greater Toronto Area. It is recognized as a North American leader in its delivery of services, which are focused on enhancing quality of life, building on individual strengths and promoting independence – recognizing that access to secure and affordable housing is a key determinant for the health and well-being of people living with HIV. Learn more about their work.