Rapper
Promotes Safe Sex to Young Canadians
Canadian Hip-Hop
Artist Rochester AKA Juice
Teams Up With
The African and Caribbean Council on HIV/AIDS in Ontario to Promote HIV/AIDS
Awareness Through A
Television Advertisement
Toronto –
Canadian rapper
Rochester aka Juice has lend his support to the African and Caribbean Council
on HIV/AIDS in Ontario (ACCHO), Keep It Alive
Campaign through his participation in a television ad to promote HIV/AIDS awareness among young people.
The commercial featuring
Rochester is designed to raise awareness on HIV,
promote safer sex, and help to reduce the stigma associated with HIV among the
African and Caribbean communities in Ontario.
The commercial will air from January 23 to March 3, 2007 on major Canadian
networks including Much More Music, OMNI, CFTO, City TV and Sun TV.
“I hope that using my name and image can strengthen the Keep It Alive Campaign as a powerful force in informing young people about HIV testing and other ways
they can protect themselves,” states Rochester.
This isn’t
the first time Toronto born Rochester has been fusing his music and celebrity
with life-saving HIV/AIDS information. As a youth advocate in the fight against
HIV/AIDS Rochester has spoken to over 10,000 Canadian youth as part of an
HIV/AIDS education program with the 411 Initiative For Change as well as taken
part in featured performances at the 2006 International Aids Conference.
Canadian youth are vulnerable to HIV
infection as a result of many factors, including risky sexual behavior,
substance use, and misconceptions that HIV is not a threat to the.
“As young people
are highly impacted by HIV/AIDS, this is possibly the most important cause I
could lend my time and energy to, explains Rochester. “My commercial serves as a
reminder that HIV infection rates among young people in Canada are rising, and more specifically within
the African – Caribbean
community.”
As of 2004, the Ontario HIV Epidemiological Monitoring Unit estimated that people from Africa and the Caribbean comprised 14% of all people in Ontario infected with HIV. Moreover, the number of African and Caribbean people in Ontario infected with HIV increased by over 80% in the previous five years.
Contact: The 411 Initiative For
Change
416-473-3595 //
connect@whatsthe411.ca
/ / www.whatsthe411.ca
Notes to Editor
-Watch the commercial here
www.whatsthe411.ca/juice
-More information about Rochester aka Juice at
www.rochesterakajuice.ca
-More information on ACCHO, and their Keep It Alive campaign at
www.accho.ca
