Halkitis is recognized with this APA Citizen Psychologist Presidential Citation for his unwavering dedication to stemming the HIV/AIDS epidemic and other health disparities through sustained advocacy that addresses important social and public health issues of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.
Halkitis is committed to advancing the health, well‐being and rights of this community and works with and for the populations he studies. He has collaborated with agencies in New Jersey and New York including the Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC), Harlem United, the African American Office of Gay Concerns, Body Positive, Project Samaritan and the LGBT Center of New York City to facilitate the rapid translation and dissemination of new and critical information to both underserved community members and social service and health care providers serving LGBT youth and adults.
Notably, Halkitis served as a task force member for the GMHC, the world’s oldest AIDS service organization, helping the organization develop its public policy statement on methamphetamine addiction in relation to the HIV epidemic as well as New York State’s Ending the Epidemic Taskforce. He was a member of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association Crystal Meth Advisory Leadership Group. He was elected to the Advisory Committee on HIV and STD Prevention of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Health Services Research Administration’s. Halkitis has also been a member of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention-mandated HIV Planning Council of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, which works to set policy for HIV prevention programming. He currently is an advisory board member on PARADISO, working with colleagues in Greece to raise awareness and reduce discrimination faced by the LGBT population in health care.
Additionally, Halkitis served on the advisory board of the New York Academy of Medicine’s study on health care in the LGBT community; as the vice chair of Body Positive, Inc., an AIDS service organization in New York that provides education, psychosocial interventions, and training to individuals infected and affected by HIV/AIDS; and on the board of directors of GMHC. Currently, he serves on the board of directors of three organizations: The HIV League, which awards scholarships to HIV-positive students, and the Generations Project, which focuses on preserving the history of the LGBT population, as well as the Hyacinth Foundation, the leading AIDS service organization of New Jersey.