Jay MacGillivray

Jay is honoured to have been asked to join SGMT. She is of settler background. Pronouns are she/they interchangeably. As you may be able to tell from their baby photo, they arrived mono-browed, pugilistic, and a commie-pinko-queer, quite ready to fix a few things.

Jay has been providing harm-reduction rooted, trauma-aware care for over 35 years. She is one of the first registered midwives in Canada.

Their clinical focus is sexual and reproductive care and research with clients living with HIV and those with a greater chance of acquiring HIV imposed upon them by Social Determinants of Health.

Jay works with folks who are street affected and made marginalized. Most are reluctant/unable to access appropriate and dignified health care because of 2SLGBTQQII-phobia, lack of safe transportation and other chronic barriers, institutional racism, previous horrible experiences with providers, HIV stigma, and other devastating effects of SDH.

Their work involves a deep outreach to tent encampments, ravine and bridge communities, street agencies, and respite centres. They particularly work with those affected by severe mental illness, life-altering substance use, histories of incarceration in conflict zones or migration trails, interactions with the Canadian 'justice/'protection' industry, and non-autonomous sex work. Many have been trafficked either in Canada or globally. All have experienced extreme-often intergenerational-trauma.

Jay is also Co-founder and Co-director, alongside Dr. Mark Yudin, of the ‘Positive Pregnancy Program’ (P3), a multidisciplinary, and community-involved reproductive program working with the HIV + community. P3 has proudly worked with hundreds of HIV-affected families choosing to have a child. P3 is placed at St Michael’s hospital. P3 has over time, and with nurturing, grown to become an internationally recognized model of care and has been called 'the gold standard of HIV reproductive care.