How could something as simple as yoga have a positive impact on the lives of people living with a condition as complex as HIV or AIDS? Countless ways, in fact. To start with, there have been a plethora of studies indicating positive correlations between yoga practice and the improvement in many of the health conditions that people living with HIV experience, such as depression, anxiety, substance abuse, heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and blood sugar, as well as headaches and chronic pain source https://www.yogajournal.com/lifestyle/health-hope-and-hiv. More specifically, several research teams in Germany, India, Africa and Spain have found that yoga can slow down the progression of the condition itself, as well as encouraging a more active approach to personal health and self-care, which has the consequent impact of reducing the spread of the virus itself source https://hivpolicyspeakup.wordpress.com/ashtanga-yoga-and-hiv/ Research tells us that yoga has profound benefits for those living with AIDS. In addition to research, individual stories, such as this one source http://www.hivplusmag.com/prevention/mental-health/2014/02/20/how-yoga-helped-me-choose-live-hiv-instead-dying-aids - which describes how yoga helped one man live with HIV instead of dying of AIDS – can help us to understand the personal experience of yoga practitioners, and the particular impact yoga has had on their life and illness. This article source https://hivpolicyspeakup.wordpress.com/ashtanga-yoga-and-hiv/, written by an HIV positive woman who practices yoga 6 days a week, describes the incredible effect the practice – in combination with medication – allows her to feel healthier now than when she was HIV negative. With the message about the benefit of yoga reaching more and more people who are HIV positive, there are a number of wonderful HIV-specific yoga programs developing around the world. This class source https://www.nuvo.net/news/news/yoga-class/article_d7cf8599-2e11-5f8a-87f2-bd2204a0c576.html, for example, runs twice a week in the USA and is free to anyone living with HIV. While there aren’t many specified yoga-for-HIV programs running at present in Australia, most experienced yoga teachers will provide a class environment that is supportive of overall health and can help you to cultivate the numerous benefits that research shows yoga provides everyone – inclusive of those living with HIV.