iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 08/10/2025

My Diablo IV sorceress and I have similar public speaking styles (mysterious orb)

A screenshot of a sorceress in Diablo IV, wearing a cape with a floating red orb hovering above her right hand

Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

That’s the end of the Joint Australasian HIV&AIDS and ASRH Conferences. For various reasons, it’s been a while since I attended a sexual health conference, and this was a great one to come back to. Lots of familiar faces and fascinating presentations. Looking forward to 2026! #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Save the date banner for next year’s conference, to be held from 14th to 17th September in Melbourne

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Stephanie again emphasises that congenital syphilis is an systems failure requiring systemic solutions: investment in sexual health infrastructure, system change, normalisation of testing, reduction of stigma, and meaningful partnerships #ASRH2025

Lessons from Other Regions:
Strong surveillance
Infectious diseases in pregnancy screening programme: ISOSS
Universal repeat screening
Investment in sexual health infrastructure
Systems change, not just clinician effort, is key

Congenital syphilis = sentinel health system failure
Universal + repeat screening = Normalising testing = reducing stigma
Implementation research closes the gap
Partnerships across 0&G, sexual health, paeds, public health essential

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Stephanie’s key principles of prevention emphasise early and repeat screening and timeline treatment, but also the importance of partner notification and treatment - it’s not enough to just tell women to tell their partners #ASRH2025

Key Principles of Prevention
1. Early antenatal screening
2. Repeat screening later in pregnancy
3. Timely maternal treatment
4. Partner management
5. Infant follow-up

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Now speaking on the changes in the Australian testing guidelines (more tests recommended). Stephanie’s keynote is largely clinical, but here she’s talking about the vital role these guidelines play in normalising syphilis testing, which is a neat link for the social and cultural attendees #ASRH2025

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Notification data in Australia - the key detail in this graph is that the red represents congenital cases resulting in infant death #ASRH2025

Figure 6: Notifications (n) and notification rate (per 100,000 live births) of congenital syphilis, by Indigenous status, remoteness area, and year, 2016 - Q4 2024
There’s a lot of red

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Second keynote Stephanie Bond giving a sobering overview of congenital syphilis globally - the increase in the US over the last ten years is grim and some Pacific Island nations have among the highest rates in the world #ASRH2025

Graph showing a tenfold increase in congenital syphilis in the USA in the last ten years

Graph showing rising rates of syphilis in women of reproductive age in the UK

Heat map of Pacific Island countries with highest prevalence of syphilis in ANC

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Tying the cross-cutting themes together now into a framework for Indigenous sexual and reproductive justice, highlighting the role of discourse at the core of many health inequities and the role of Indigenous knowledges in addressing them #ASRH2025

Indigenous
Sexual &
Reproductive
Justice through
Indigenous-led
Research:
Cross cutting themes
Social norms & assumptions
• Unravelling how social social forces such as colonisation, poverty, racism, sexism shape and constrain Mãori sexual and reproductive lives, decisions, opportunities and aspirations
Knowledge
• Unravelling whether knowledge produced 'about indigenous people is accurate, and creating space for indigenous knowledge to be developed in this space
Health Practice
• Unravelling how discourse might shape inequitable health practices, and working to correct that
Pedagogy
• Working to understand how we can educate our communities for healthy, safe, ethical, and happy sexual, reproductive, and family lives

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Le Grice’s final study is on infertility in the Māori context and the intersections here of medical fertility treatment and cultural values around family, pregnancy, childbirth and child rearing #ASRH2025

Mãori & Pacific infertility discourse & knowledge
• Mãori and Pacific people in New Zealand have higher overall reproductive rates than European people (Khawaja et al., 2000;
Urale et al., 2019) that obscures the possibility of Mãori and Pacific infertility (Foese, 2018; Glover et al., 2008; Reynolds & Smith,
2012).
• The sociocultural norm of having many children within Mãori and Pacific communities created challenges for those experiencing infertility, reaching out and access support, creating intense pressures on their couple relationships (Le Grice et al., 2023).
• The absence of culturally resonant wrap around support across key pressure points in a journey of infertility - traversing pregnancy loss (miscarriage, still birth), seeking eligibility for public funding, and going through the process of medicalised treatments - created intense (and life-threatening) psychosocial impacts (Le Grice et al.
Artist: Riona Kipa, Tokipa des grasth

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Le Grice now speaking about her research on abortion among Māori women. Historically framed around some awful racist stereotypes, but in a the modern context more accepted in the community and often supported with cultural practice #ASRH2025

Mãori & abortion:
Discourse & knowledge
• Dominant representations of traditional
Maori reproductive practice indicate disapproval of abortion (Turia, 2007
Rimene, Hassan, & Broughton, 1998;
Manihera & Turnbull, 1990).
• Yet, historical accounts of Mãori practices of abortion tell a more complex story.
• Abortion was not linguistically distinguished from miscarriage (T.
Smith, 2012).
• Known and accepted methods for 2002, 8. Slot, 2002, Tangon au, 2003).
Artist: Rawiri Horne
Gifted by Waikaremoana Waitoki

Mãori & abortion:
Colonising discourse, knowledge & health practice
• Existing research about Mäori engagement with abortion, written by Päkehã (European) psychiatrists.
Claims about Mãori and abortion drew from colonising, oppressive understandings about Mäori aligned with notions of Mãori 'savagery (Le Grice & Braun, 2017).
• Assumed patriarchal gender relations, and negative and vengeful subject positions for women (e.g. Hunton, 1977).
• Suggested abortion was widely practiced among Maon due to "savagery" (e.g. Hunton, 1977) -
• Suggested abortion was not practiced due to
"superstition" (e.g. Gluckman, 1973, 1981).
• Discourse informed the pathologisation & criminalisation of Mäori women who sought abortion as reproductive healthcare
• Discourse aligned with wider national narratives of missionaries
saving" Maori through British
colonisation and assumption of rule (Pool, 2015) through the construction of Mãori cultural "deficits'

Mãori &
abortion:
Mãori
discourse, knowledge & health practice
• The deliberate loss of conception (abortion) is not anathema to Mãori knowledges, ways of being and patterns of practice
• Mãori are diverse in their understanding and engagement with matauranga Mãori, with implications for their perspectives on abortion
• Christian influences, focus on protecting the new life (although often framed as personal choice)
• Mãori women's rangatiratanga, understood as women's self determination in the context of her unique circumstances, hopes, dreams and aspirations
• Focus and priorisation of whanau, and care for one another (whangai, and/or support for the individual woman)
• The practice of whenua ki te whenua (returning pregnancy tissue/placenta to ancestral lands) nurtures connections between atua, tangata and whenua providing kai atawhai (sheltering and protection) in these domains

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

Opening keynote of the final day of the conference Jade Le Grice opening with some insights into sex and sexuality education among Māori young people in Aotearoa. Storytelling, language and culture strongly foregrounded #ASRH2025

Mãori & Sexuality education: Pedagogy

• The growth of online media has seen understandings of relationships that reinforce Western social pressures
Relationships, sex, and sexuality are portrayed in ways that reinforce
sexism, racism, and heterosexism prevalent in our society
• Online contexts provide animportance site of intervention
• Creating accessible content informed by matauranga (Mãori knowledge) and tikanga Mãori (Mãori practices) provides young Mãori with a window into Mãori ways of knowing, being, and doing sexuality

Mãori & Sexuality Education: Discourse and Storytelling

Contemporary realities of Mäori youth are complex, shaped by the impacts of colonisation and intersecting vectors of oppression.
The marginalisation of Mãori ways of being, doing, and knowing opens a space for racialised understandings of
Mãori girls and boys to make sense of themselves, their choices, identities, pathways and futures.
education: . We share rangatahi prakau (stories) based on stories
shared by our research participants, alongside a set of
storytelling.
enquiry questions.
We make visible the challenges that young Mãori encounter, pathways to make sense of the social context that shapes them, and how they can overcome them.
• In context with the mätauranga (Mãori knowledge) we have shared, we want to support rangatahi to come back to who they are and shake off the conditioning

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Simon Graham taking a novel angle on strengths-based approaches to sexual health research with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people by opening talking explicitly about funding - how things are done, how they should be done, and some examples of doing it well #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Strengths-based approaches actions
1. Engagement way before starting the grant application
2. Partnership agreements with Aboriginal organisations
a. Who owners the data, IP, authorship on papers (first/ last authors)
3. Community benefits not academic benefits - MY promotion, papers, grants
4. Hiring First Nations people as project manager not just to recruit or interviewers
6. PhD scholarships - knowing an Indigenous person to accept the PhD scholarships. Lets Including a PhD scholarship and then worry about find
someone after we win = handing to a white PhD student
6. First Nations Cis early in the list, not just the one at the end of the list
7. The deficit approach is great for a grant application

Next Generation Youth Cohort Study
• Pre-grant engagement and long lead up period
• Indigenous led
• Partnerships with local organisations at data collection sites
• Aboriginal ethics committees
• Indigenous PhD students
• Indigenous leads salaries paid for at sites
• Feedback sessions of analyses conducted
• Engagement about what would you like to see for phase 2 grant

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Margaret explains many use the “duty of care” to justify “protecting” people with disability FROM sex but a strengths-based approach involves balancing duty of care with the dignity of risk to facilitate healthy risk enablement - neither overprotection or neglect #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

A diagram showing duty of care balanced against dignity of risk on a continuum between overprotection and neglect, with the centre point labeled risk enablement

Risk Enablement
• Risk enablement, also called positive risk taking, is a way of supporting people which helps to maintain people's choice and
control over activities.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Next speaker Margaret Spencer now articulating the principles of strengths-based approaches to reproductive rights with women with intellectual disability - a three-way combination that many working the sexual and reproductive health space might find challenging #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Factors which affect the persons with intellectual disability exercising their right to sexual intimacy, and parenthood
• Societal threat (legacy of eugenics discourse)
• Ableism
• Deficit Approach
• Risk-averse practices

Being strengths-based involves:
1. Being Disability-Informed
2. Engaging well
3. Adopting a risk enablement approach
4. Prioritising supported decision-making
5. Fostering circles of support

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

JJ refers to “script breaking” as the process by which study participants accessed the authenticity, care and reciprocity encapsulated by “queer and trans sexual joy” #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

TO CONCLUDE
2SLGBTQ+ communities are not utopias free from violence. What the study found, however, was that much of this violence reflected the reproduction of cisheteronormativity and the settler colonial logics of objectification, domination, and conquest
Queer and trans sexual joy confronted these logics and seemed to alchemize them. Through script breaking, participants described greater authenticity, embodied pleasure, care, and reciprocity vis a vis queer and trans sexual joy.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

JJ Wright joining remotely from Canada to share some incredible work on queer and trans joy as disruptive to heteronormativity, patriarchy, shame and rape culture. Delighted to see pleasure foregrounded as a strength at conference that often has a heavy biomedical focus #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

JJ Wright joining via video call from their brightly lit living room

By highlighting queer sexual joy as a place to imagine sexual cultures away from rape culture, we might loosen up the rigid dominant sexual scripts and find more flexibility, ease, and joy in sex despite the ambiguitics inherent to it.

Study participants talked about their struggle with homophobia and transphobia as mediating if not co-constructed the euphoria and joy of their subversive sexual and gender formations.
Over 80% identified as survivors of gender-based violence.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Joanne says that what we call “strengths” can be understood through two logics: logics of individualism and logics or relationalities, which position strengths as fixed traits residing in an individual vs as social practices and community resources #HIVAIDS2025 #ASHR2025

Logics of individualism ('strengths' found within individuals and immediate environments)
Logics of relationalities (strengths' found in relationships, goods and opportunities)
Individualising logics can..
Cast young people as not 'resilient-enough'
• Perpetuate approaches that focus on changing individual behaviours and choices
• Hides other ways of understanding
'strengths-based approaches
Relational logics can….
Shift focus to changing relationships, goods and opportunities within networks

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Joanne Bryant opens session on strengths-based approaches in sexual and reproductive health research by summarising the main approaches identified in the literature to “strengths-based” work with marginalised young people #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Joanne presenting in front of a slide that reads

Main approaches
Broadly characterised: "positive adaptation within the context of adversity"
(Alessi et al., 2020:11240)
Main language and concepts:
1. Resilience (n=19)
2. Protective factors (n=13)
3. Resilience and protective factors (n= 12)
4. Social capital (n=16)

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Nothing subtle about using this image to open a presentation on the global implications of funding cuts to HIV-related aid in the current political climate, but the data presented by Felicity Young from Health Equity Matters justifies the bold choice #HIVAIDS2025

A painting featuring the four horsemen of the Apocalypse from the Christian Bible’s Book of Revelation

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

This jumped out at me from Jen Power’s presentation on intersections of HIV and migration and quality of life for Asian-born MSM living with HIV, drawn from HIV Futures. This theme of “belonging” appeared throughout the data, re: community but also care, reflecting importance of peers #HIVAIDS2025

Jen presenting in front of a slide that reads

NAVIGATING BELONGING
Experiences of racism and exclusion
"Culturaly it's very different how I grew up, so I guess even like after being In Australia for 7 years now I stil find it sometimes can be a fittle bit (ot a) struggle because of my race (-|I guess just because of my appearance it's very different than what Australian society looks Tke." - NSW, HIV
Resilience and empowerment through HIV experience
I think you know because the health care system that treated me well when I first diagnosed positive in Victoria, I was inspired to work in the heath care setting, that's why I've chosen to work in (heath field)"-Adam, VIC, 30s
Representation fosters belonging and safety
It's just the fact that when as a client if I go to a group, a peer group, a service, and I con see someone of my skin colour there, I know I will be safe. That is why having representation of the groups we're trying to reach In the work is so important." - NSW, community health promotion officer

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

Huge honour to present the Bi+ Sexual Health and HIV Study today at the conference with some of our amazing investigator team. I’ve had such a great time with this piece of work and I can’t wait for us to really start digging into the data and writing up what we find #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Bella, Steve, Heather, Ben, Daniel and Jen sitting along a panel-style table in front of an introductory slide with their names and the title of the session on it (Affiliate Organisation Session: BiSHH: Understanding sexual health and HIV needs and risks of Australian bi+ people)

Bella, Heather, Jen, Ben and Steve posing for a group photo. They are all wearing conference lanyards and Heather and Steve are both wearing bisexual flag colours

Heather speaking at the podium in front of her “conclusions” slide.

Conclusions
• Our sample of participants lived across all regions of Australia.
• Bi+ people have a wide range of gender and sexual identities.
• Fewer than half of participants were out to their healthcare professionals.
• Bi+ people experience adverse health outcomes compared to the general Australian population:
• Higher probable mental illness.
• Higher levels of recent drug use including injecting drug use.
• More likely to have ever experienced sexual violence and coercion.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 15/09/2025

Kath’s participants identified social media as a site of risk for workplace health and safety for people doing sexual health work in the digital space - this reflects my own experience but I feel it’s gotten so much worse in just the last few years #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025 @katha.bsky.social

Findings:
Our orgs want cheap reach into our
PLWHIV communities for our messages and community development BUT it isn't working anymore. Reach is limited. AND social media less safe.
Workshop participant

We've done quite a bit of thinking about how, as an organisation, we're going to manage those group conversations [on messaging apps] - given that there's a sort of 24/7 potential for people to be engaging and talking. And how we work around moderation, and our staff's right to switch off, and all of those kind of things.
Manager

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 15/09/2025

The amazing @katha.bsky.social presenting on building digital capabilities in hostile social media environments. The context stuff is fascinating - this has been a deeply weird but also vitally important four year period for Kath to have been leading this research #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Why are digital capabilities important for the HIN sector?
• Digital and data technologies are central to both health and social support systems and community experiences of connection, wellbeing & learning
• 'Digital health' is not the same thing as 'digital public health'
• Digital content moderation policies often flag HIV/SRH content as
'against community standards'
• Targeted harassment and surveillance of marginalised communities is increasing - impacting health consumers and health organisations.

Digital transformation policy environment
National Strategies and Plans
• The Digital Health Blueprint and Action Plan 2023
- 2033, Australian Department of Health and Aged Care
• The Digital Health Action Plan, 2023
• National Digital Health Strategy 2023-2028,
Australian Digital Health Agency
• National Digital Health Strategy and
Roadmap 2023 - 2028, ADHA
• National Digital Health Capability Action
Plan, 2023
• Australian Digital Health Capability
Framework, ADHA/AIDH, 2024
Platform content moderation policies
• Meta's 'community notes' fact-checking model
2025
• Meta's changes to hateful conduct policy to allow more 'free speech' 2025
International Guidance
• Global Strategy on Digital health 2020-2025 - WHO, 2020 *recently extended until 2027.
• Guidance on the rights-based ethical use of digital technologies in HIV and health programmes - UNDP, 2021
• UNICEF Safer Chatbots Implementation Guide -
UNICEF, 2022
• The role of artificial intelligence in sexual and reproductive health and rights - WHO, 2024
• Digital transformation handbook for primary health care - WHO, 2024
e-Safety Office
• Online Safety Act 2021
• Industry codes and standards (ratified 2025)
• Phase 1: illegal content (eg. child exploitation material)
• Phase 2: preventing young people from accessing “inappropriate' content

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 15/09/2025

Survey participants opposed criminalisation and showed strong understanding of U=U. Only 3% agreed that police should manage HIV transmission and 4% agreed the current system is fair #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Results from the attitudes section of the survey showing disapproval of the current model and support for a model where HIV transmission is managed by the Public Health Authorities and only intentional or deliberate transmission is criminalised

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 15/09/2025

Brooke and Rodrigo from Burnett Foundation Aotearoa presenting findings from a survey on HIV criminalisation. I wasn’t aware of this context of HIV criminalisation in NZ - one of the highest rates of criminalisation per capital in the world #HIVAIDS2025 #ASRH2025

Intro slide

Policed, or protected?
Insights from the HIV Criminalisation Survey in Aotearoa New Zealand

Context
• People living with HIV may face prosecution under the Crimes Act (1961) for:
o HIV non-disclosure,
o transmission, or
o exposure during sex (if not using a condom).
• Aotearoa New Zealand has one of the highest rates of HIV criminalisation per capita globally.
• Public Health Act (1956)
• No research to date.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 15/09/2025

I’m at the Joint Australasian HIV&AIDS and ASRH Conferences on Kaurna country this week - currently listening to Lucy and Beth from ACON presenting on the fight to repeal “spitting laws” (mandatory testing) in NSW #HIVAIDS2025 #ASHR2025

Lucy presenting key points from the Ombudsman report

The Ombudsman report
The Act is mostly being used in cases where there is no real risk of a worker contracting a blood-borne disease
2. We saw no evidence that the Act is improving the health and wellbeing of workers
3. Protections for third parties are ineffective
4. The Act is disproportionately impacting Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander people
5. There are legal complications with testing by consent
6. Senior officers of agencies are ill-equipped to be making determinations about MTOs, and decision-making processes within the NSWPF seem particularly poor

Beth presenting a slide that says

This is a national issue
• MDT laws in: NSW, Vic, QLD, WA, NT, SA
• Laws differ in terms of:
o Penalties for non-compliance e.g. WA: up to $12,000 fine or 12 months' Imprisonment.
• Who can be tested, how are they safeguarded? e.g. SA: exposure likely, no appeal. o Police powers e.g. NT: detention 'as long as reasonably necessary'
• Decision-making authority
o Transparency: FOI?

Lucy presenting a slide that says

So what now?
• Statutory review commencing late September
• Public vs targeted consultation
• Advocate for repeal vs amendment

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Really love these graphic recordings from Dr Krista Stelkia and Anita Manshadi’s priority setting gathering on racism in healthcare with Indigenous health leaders in Canada. I’ve attended consultations that use this “note taking” method and it’s so much more engaging than boring old minutes #Lowitja

A graphic illustration mapping notes from the gathering. It is titled “Identifying priorities to address First Nations-specific racism in the BC health care system”

A graphic illustration mapping notes from the gathering. It is titled “Convening and collaborating: Action-oriented pathways to address First Nations-specific racism”

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

The final speaker on this panel is Torres Strait Islander man and climate scholar and activist Francis Nona, who has recently published a discussion paper on the intersections between law, rights and climate justice #Lowitja

Francis Nona speaking on a panel on the main stage at the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

The two incredible Māori speakers on this panel are Hinekaa Mako and Mike Smith, both getting repeated rounds of applause as they talk about fierce Indigenous resistance to big polluters seeking to exploit land and sea in Aotearoa #Lowitja

Hinekaa Mako and Mike Smith speaking on a panel on the main stage at the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Johnnell and Coreen Parker from Banjima Native Title Aboriginal Corporation speaking powerfully about the ongoing impacts of past asbestos mining on their traditional lands. The film Yurlu Country follows Coreen’s late father’s battle for justice #Lowitja

Johnnell and Coreen Parker speaking on a panel on the main stage at the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

This panel came with reading material, which I’m looking forward to diving into later #Lowitja

Two booklets, one titled Murru Minya: Our story and a Lowitja Institute Discussion paper on ethical conduct in research

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

The speakers on this panel - names on slide or in alt text #Lowitja

Aunty June Councillor, Ashley Councillor, Aunty Dotty Bagshaw, Daniel Morrison-Bird, Aunty Mary Kyle, Aunty Kayleen Jackson, Sheanah Ludwick and Michelle Kennedy onstage at the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Felicity Colls opening a panel on community calls to action on the rights to best practice ethical research - something aligned to some of my current work. She said communities want research and see its value, but don’t often see real consultation, capacity building or impact on the ground #Lowitja

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Second keynote Justin Mohamed speaking about the origins of the Lowitja Institute. Amazing to think how far the Institute has come and what those early pioneers with a big vision have achieved #Lowitja

Justin Mohamed speaking on the main stage of the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

I’m always so interested to hear about different models of Indigenous-led healthcare from different countries that don’t have an equivalent to our ACCHS network. The shared principles of Indigenous governance, ownership of data and true cultural safety are critical #Lowitja

Prof Lightfoot speaking on the main stage of the Lowitja Conference in front of a slide on the BC First Nations Health Authority

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Prof Lightfoot is the second keynote I’ve seen in the last six months or so speak on Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. I’d really like to learn about it in more depth, so if I have any First Nations followers from Canada, please send me anything I should read #Lowitja

Prof Lightfoot speaking on the main stage of the Lowitja Conference in front of a slide on the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Opening keynote Prof Sheryl Lightfoot speaking on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. All people have a right to health and Indigenous people also have a right to collective health that cannot be divorced from self-determination and cultural obligations #Lowitja

Prof Lightfoot presenting on the main stage of the Lowitja Conference in front of a slide on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

Shoutout to #Lowitja Conferebce for providing live captioning on plenary sessions - great to see events like this made as accessible as possible!

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

Some real heavy hitters on the Racism and Health panel at #Lowitja Conference: Prof Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Dr Alicia Veasey and Prof Yin Paradies

Panel members seated on stage at the Lowitja Conference

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

Looking forward to seeing what Dr Sarah Bourke and her team do with this new project on Indigenous identity and wellbeing in urban settings. They’ve just started work after an extensive consultation period (already a wonderfully common theme in the projects presented at #Lowitja conference)

Dr Bourke presenting at the Lowitja Conference. Her opening slide reads “Where we belong: Connecting Indigenous identity and wellbeing in the city”

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 07/11/2024

I was delighted to catch up with two of my old work buddies from my Hepatitis NSW days at the #ECAustralia hepatitis C forum today. Both still doing amazing work!

A tall blonde woman and a tall man with a beard stand on either side of Heather, who is usually also tall but in this specific instance looks unusually short by comparison

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 12/09/2024

This second presentation draws on a study I recently published a paper from that explored how LGBTQ+ Aboriginal young people imagine sexual healthcare that would meet their needs

Speaker
Dr Heather McCormack
Scientia Research Fellow
Kirby Institute, UNSW Sydney
Imagined possibilities of sexual healthcare that meets the needs of sexuality and gender diverse Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander young people
© 2:00 PM - 2:12 PM
Photo of Heather, who is wearing a green dress and pink glasses

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 12/09/2024

Very much looking forward to the IUSTI and HIV conferences next week. I have two presentations planned, the first co-presented with the delightful Kevin Dong from Western Sydney LHD on a HIV testing campaign for Mandarin-speaking and Arabic-speaking heterosexual men who have sex with men

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 21/08/2024

It’s fancy hat day! Feels a little anticlimactic to be graduating three months after my PhD was formally awarded and six months into my first academic appointment, but I’m still very much looking forward to the ceremony

Heather wearing graduation robes, holding her PhD bonnet on a jaunty angle

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 25/07/2024

Surprised and delighted to be named a finalist for Charles Sturt University Alumni of the Year in two separate categories! Thanks to the CSU team and my fellow alumni for your contributions to my ongoing adventures

A tile featuring an image of Heather, who has pink streaks in her hair and is wearing a mustard top and pink and blue glasses. The tile announces that she is a finalise in the 2024 Charles Sturt University Alumni of the Year in the categories First Nations Excellence and Research Excellence

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 22/04/2024

This is one of the most exciting emails I’ve ever received in my life

Dear Heather,
CONGRATULATIONS! I’m happy to inform you that the Faculty has approved your revisions and recommended that you be awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/04/2024

The speakers on the #ochreconvocation24 HDR and ECR panel are all exceptional, high achieving researchers, but it’s really noteworthy that none of them followed a traditional pathway to academia - not atypical for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander academics!

A panel of five Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in front of a screen that reads “Panel: HDRs and ECRs”

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/04/2024

This slide is a little hard to read in a photo but it’s a really interesting example of the application of two-eyed seeing at an institutional level for co-development of First Nations research capacity

Diagram of two eyed seeing for co development

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Dr Heather McCormack @heathermccormack.bsky.social · 18/04/2024

I’m at the #ochreconvocation24, currently listening to international keynote speaker Prof Malcolm King speaking on strengthening Indigenous health research capacity in Canada. As always, noting the similarities in our colonial histories in these calls to action for reconciliation in health

Program booklet for the 2024 OCHRe Convocation

Reconciliation Considerations - Health
C2A 18
Acknowledge that current state of Aboriginal health in Canada is a direct results of previous Canadian government policies, including residential schools
C2A 19
Set measurable targets and work collaboratively to achieve them with clear reporting. This should be an ethical obligation
C2A 22
Recognise the value of Aboriginal healing practices and use them in the treatment of Aboriginal patients in collaboration with Aboriginal healers and elders

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