Latics are pleased to announce they will be supporting the World AIDS Day initiative at tonight's League One game against Walsall at Boundary Park.

One in three people with HIV in the UK don't know they've got it. Instant HIV testing produces results in just sixty seconds using blood taken from a finger prick.

Local HIV charity Body Positive North West (BPNW) now offers free instant HIV testing from its base in Whalley Range, Manchester, just minutes from the city centre.

This year marks the 21^st Anniversary of World AIDS Day. An estimated 21,000 people in the UK are living with HIV undiagnosed. BPNW is launching a year-long campaign to promote instant HIV testing. The go4it campaign uses a Green Ribbon as its emblem to encourage people to HIV test.

The charity has teamed up with Oldham Athletic Football Club to raise awareness of HIV testing. The team will wear Green Ribbon T-shirts during the warm up prior to tonight's game to show solidarity with the campaign to encourage young people to test.

The event is part of the 'A minute of your time- 21 reasons to the test, the red ribbon comes of age' campaign that is being run across Oldham to commemorate World AIDS Day 2008.

In the absence of a national campaign for HIV, BPNW has decided local initiatives, developed in partnership with high-profile partners is the best way to reach people where they are, whether that is in football grounds or bars or clubs.

Every year for the past ten years more heterosexuals have been diagnosed HIV positive than gay men. In the North West over 1,500 people are likely to be living with the infection completely unaware.

Latest research shows that people are less likely to refuse HIV testing if the result were available there and then. Not all hospitals in the North West have access to the latest instant HIV tests.

Until now HIV testing has largely been confined to hospitals. The government is committed to expanding HIV testing to a broader range of settings including GP's surgeries and community based organisations such as HIV charities which have traditionally focussed on providing support and information to people already diagnosed with the disease.

The idea was first used in Botswana some years ago to counter some of the stigma associated with the Red Ribbon, the universal symbol of HIV.

Robert Fieldhouse of BPNW explains "The Red Ribbon will always be the symbol of AIDS. The Green Ribbon does not change that. It is a call to action, an acknowledgement that HIV testing is valuable and that life after diagnosis can be healthy and positive.

BPNW has developed a website - www.bpnw.org.uk/go4it - to help people find clinics across the north west that offer instant HIV testing.

To help BPNW fund its free HIV testing service text 'go4it' to 84424. Texts cost £1.50.