(COLORADO SPRINGS) — It’s Women’s History Month, and to celebrate, FOX21 News is sharing the stories of remarkable women in our community. We asked you to nominate the extraordinary women of Southern Colorado for an award and received almost 100 nominations.
One inspiring submission highlighted Lupe Uribe-Joyner. She helps hundreds of people at the Southern Colorado Health Network. The organization helps people with HIV and AIDS with a very wide array of support services.
“She’s probably one the most compassionate people that you’ll find. She welcomes everyone into her life and she really provides a support structure and just helps guide people,” said Richard Blair, who nominated Uribe-Joyner and works alongside her as their Director of Capital Campaigns.
With a Social Work Degree from Mexico, she moved to the U.S. in 1989 and worked hard to learn English to help people here.
“We was helping people to die [of AIDS], now we help people to live,” said Uribe-Joyner.
She has been especially helpful for the Latino women population, where she says infection rates are increasing quickly. Not only does she work with people one-on-one to break down language barriers and offer support, but she’s also shaped programs for prevention and education among other things.
“We [don’t] need… new infections. We can reduce this, but… they’re increasing because we[‘re] not talking about it,” said Uribe-Joyner.
It’s work that’s not easy, but they say it’s deeply important. That’s because they still see lots of new cases in the Pikes Peak Region alone.
“Right here this office we have maybe about 565 clients,” said Uribe-Joyner.
Blair added, “It’s extremely important. In El Paso County, there’s more than 1,300 people living with HIV right now. Reported living with HIV. There’s probably, you know, 50 plus people that get reported new infections every year.”
Although her positive impact reaches far past the health network. She played a key role in opening the first HIV medical clinic in Colorado Springs. She also trains people to be educators across the state, and so much more.
“It used to be like 25 pills a day they had to take,” said Uribe-Joyner, “[Now,] to be able to take… one pill a day, and also have a pill to help them not get HIV, you know the only thing more is to let people know, educate people. No education and people don’t know that can happen to you. You know, it’s really very important. Teach talking, bringing it to the table.”
On April 1st, tune in to learn who wins FOX21’s Remarkable Woman of the Year award. The winner will have $1,000 donated to a non-profit of their choice and will be added to the running for our company wide, national Woman of the Year award.
For our nationwide Woman of the Year award, the 125 local winners will be honored at a star-studded awards dinner & ceremony in Los Angeles. At the ceremony, the winner will be announced. She will be awarded $25,000 for the nonprofit closest to her heart.
