Toronto dining experience aims to eliminate stigma associated with those living with HIV

A new Toronto dining experience is aiming to eliminate the stigma associated with those who are HIV+.

Casey House will be holding a three-night “June’s HIV+ Eatery” event next week with multiple HIV+ chefs serving guests, and once again, it’s already sold out.

The specialty hospital provides treatment and care for people living with or at risk of HIV.

The event has been held for the last four years after Casey House found out that 53 per cent of Canadians said they wouldn’t knowingly eat food served by someone HIV+.

Stigma associated with HIV is devastating for those living with it, as one in five people are denied health services and 80 per cent of Canadians living with HIV still have concerns about disclosing their status.

Muluba Habanyama, an HIV advocate, has been apart of the event since its inception in 2018, first as a chef and now as the host and MC.

She was first diagnosed at just two years old after being born with it and spent several years of her childhood dealing the stigma and discrimination surrounding HIV.

“It’s this huge secret and I was born with this condition. I take medications, and so do other kids take medications for conditions. So I didn’t fully understand why this is a bad thing,” explained Habanyama. “It had to be a secret that unfortunately, made me feel a type of shame that I didn’t understand.

She said it wasn’t until she was old enough to under that she started to realize the stigmas surrounding HIV.

“You Google HIV yourself and you look at things and you realize, oh, like there’s not only a lot of stigma, there’s misconceptions as HIV is tied to some like taboo behaviour. And people with HIV have to go through a lot and in a lot of circumstances [people] do not have the respect and that was really difficult for me to deal with.”

Habanyama tells CityNews there has been a lot of progress when it comes to treatment and awareness of the circumstances of HIV, but there is still lots to be done.

“I do think that we have come a long way in the fact that treatment is a lot better than it definitely was back then and in the fact of, we have a little more information and a little more public information. However, I also do agree that there is still a lot more stigma and [there could be] a lot more awareness and a lot more discussions.”

She explained that even the health-care system has been difficult to navigate and has only recently started to feel comfortable with the doctors she sees.

“A lot of professionals are not educated in HIV, which is fine, but having that respect and that dignity is really important,” said Habanyama.

“And I think if they realize it or not, there is still a lot of stigma in the health-care system. I will not go to an emergency room because, in my experience, several emergency rooms do not know how to deal with HIV. It’s very hard in the health-care system, when you especially don’t have that main people that you know that you couldn’t trust because there’s a lot of stigma.

Habanyama has been involved in the June’s HIV+ Eatery since its inception and explained how important it has been to break the stigma associated with people who live with HIV, especially when it comes to cooking.

“It is interesting that many Canadians had that thought and it was very disappointing because again, that does all stem from stigma. So when these results came out from this study it was very important to do something about it and do a stigma and awareness campaign,” said Habanyama.

“So Casey house first did this pop-up restaurant in 2018 and it was so successful, people wanted more, people thought is this gonna be a restaurant forever [because] the food was very good.”

Tickets are sold out for the three-night pop-up restaurant, but you can find out more on the Casey House website.