We are Meridian:
We are a community-controlled, peer-led organisation that provides health and social support services to our community.
Canberra’s LGBTQ+ communities founded our organisation to respond to the HIV/AIDS crisis.
Our communities embrace all who are affected by HIV. Our work to end HIV continues.
We have learnt a lot about looking after our health, looking after each other and creating change.
Today, we are responding to all aspects of health, wellbeing, equity and justice for people of diverse sexualities and genders.
Our vision
A future where our communities thrive: healthy and well, free from stigma, empowered by peer connection and supported by a just and inclusive society.
Our purpose
We use peer-based, evidence-informed approaches to develop and deliver effective programs and services that respond to the needs of our communities.
Our values
Led by our communities
We are created by and serve people of diverse sexualities and genders. Our work is grounded in the lives, leadership and aspirations of the communities we serve.
Inclusivity
We welcome and celebrate the strengths of all, especially those who experience stigma, marginalisation or exclusion because of who they are.
Self-determination
We respect the right of all communities to define themselves, speak for themselves and lead their own advocacy and care.
Equity
We work to eliminate health disparities and ensure people living with HIV and those of diverse sexualities and genders have access to services that affirm who they are and meet their needs.
Courage
We speak truth to power, challenge injustice and advocate boldly, even when it is uncomfortable.
Accountability
We are transparent, responsible and committed to keeping the trust of our communities. We work positively and collaboratively to achieve impact.
Celebration
Together, we celebrate the diversity and resilience of our communities.
Our communities
We value and honour our history as an organisation established by volunteers in response to the HIV epidemic in the early 1980s. Serving people living with HIV remains at the centre of our work.
Led by community, we have evolved to also respond to the health, wellbeing and social needs of people of diverse sexualities and genders. This includes people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, queer, pansexual, asexual, trans, gender diverse and nonbinary.
And this is only part of us. We recognise that, as individuals, we have multiple, distinct and intersectional identities and experiences. Within our communities are people who are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, sex workers, from diverse cultural backgrounds and living with disability. We honour older members of our communities for their trailblazing, struggle and wisdom and young people for forging new paths in uncertain times.
Today, we know our communities by many names, including LGBTIQA+. We recognise the experiences of people with innate variations in sex characteristics. Some are LGBTQ+, many are not. We welcome all intersex people and respect their calls for self-determination. However, we are not specialists in their experience beyond shared sexualities and gender identities.
Our communities share experiences of stigma, discrimination and marginalisation because of who we are. Coming out – the emergence from being alone, an abandoning of masks and of suppressing who we are – is life changing. It is our discovery of others in whom we recognise ourselves, whose journeys are different to our own but also the same. We work to ensure that people can connect and be part of a community that celebrates the rich diversity, strength and resilience of our individual and collective experiences.
Our communities also include organisations and groups that support our vision and purpose and have similar goals and objectives. Partnership and collaboration with others are critical in meeting the intersectional needs of our communities. Our communities continue to emerge and evolve as community, social and political mores shift. As an organisation, we continue to learn and grow alongside our communities. Our commitment at Meridian is to be intentional in the words we use.
We deliver services to all people living with and affected by HIV and all people of diverse sexualities and genders, because inclusivity matters to us.
Read more about Meridian’s context and priorities in our Strategy 2025–2030.