Mayor visits award winning HIV services to mark World AIDS Day

Cllr Elizabeth Rutherford, The Mayor of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, met with clinicians, patients and volunteers at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust to show their support for World AIDS Day.

The Mayor visited Ron Johnson Ward and met with staff and inpatients. Nurses, Doctors and volunteers manned an information stand in the main atrium of the hospital in order to raise awareness about HIV and the importance of testing.  St Stephens AIDS Trust volunteers were fundraising on the day with all money raised being invested into HIV services at the hospital.

World AIDS Day marked the end of the European HIV/Hepatitis Testing Week, which saw the Trust’s Sexual Health team at 56 Dean Street providing on the spot testing in Soho, as well as encouraging patients to have blood borne virus testing in our state of the art Emergency Department at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, the first Emergency Department in the country to provide such a service.

Lee Watson, Lead Nurse for Sexual Health and Dermatology at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, said: “We are thrilled that the Mayor from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea has visited on World AIDS Day help raise awareness of HIV services at their local hospital. Such a visit provides a morale boost for staff, patients and volunteers and is a fitting way to mark this important day.”