Black scholarship on HIV and health: Configuring public health for Black emancipation

The burden of Canada's HIV epidemic has fallen disproportionately on Black communities. Canadian public health authorities and research institutions have been generally impervious to calls for responses that mobilize and support Black community expertise and leadership, and focus on the needs and circumstances of those communities. A group of Canadian scholars and community health practitioners came together in 2022 as the Interim Committee on HIV among Black Canadian Communities (ICHBCC) to develop the Black HIV Manifesto and advocate for transformative responses to HIV on the basis of the manifesto. The ICHBCC conceived and championed the Special Section on HIV, Health, and Black Canadian Communities published in the current issue of the Canadian Journal of Public Health. This special section brings together Black scholars who report and discuss their research with Black communities. We expect that the special section will engage Black scholars and other Black stakeholders to strengthen the knowledge base on HIV among Black Canadian communities, which in turn will inform new avenues for transformative policy, programs, community engagement, and advocacy in response to HIV. Furthermore, we hope that the special section initiates scholarly and community interest in Black emancipation as the conceptual basis for public health scholarship and practice to promote health equity and justice.