2009 End-of-Year letter

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2009 End-of-Year Letter

The US Global AIDS Plan

December, 2009 Click on the image to

donate to Health GAP

Dear Friend:

Your contribution to Health GAP today will be matched dollar for dollar by a challenge grant if we raise a total of $25,000 from new and existing donors this month. Thankfully, Health GAP is used to confronting challenges much larger than this one.

We were formed to confront the challenge of ensuring all people living with HIV/AIDS had access to treatment worldwide, no matter where they lived or how much they had. Less than 1 million people living with HIV/AIDS had access to life-saving medicines in the late 1990s, nearly all of who lived in wealthy countries. Wealthy governments and aid bureaucrats believed

expanding access to treatment for those living in the poorest parts of the world was impractical and not “cost-effective,” and pharmaceutical companies callously viewed it as a threat to their profits. Yet, thanks to your support, Health GAP has worked to bring treatment to nearly 4 million people in low-income countries alone since that time.

We confronted this challenge by partnering with committed policymakers and activists, and shaming decision-makers who needed it, to push for a remarkable worldwide commitment to universal access to HIV/AIDS treatment. We have already overcome many challenges so far in achieving this vision:

We reduced the price of medicines for people living with HIV/AIDS in the poorest nations to less than 2% of what they cost a decade ago.
We pushed for the creation of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria – an innovative new model of developing foreign assistance that is more democratic and accountable to front-line communities and convinced wealthy governments to contribute billions to it.
We worked with allies to end the US government’s focus on abstinence-only-until-marriage HIV prevention policies by convincing policymakers that these policies were ineffective and immoral.

Myriad challenges remain. Wealthy donor countries are already backtracking on their commitments, even though nearly two-thirds of people living with HIV/AIDS currently in need of treatment still do not have access. For example, there is a growing backlash against foreign assistance, with disingenuous arguments being made that pit the fight against HIV/AIDS versus other vital investments in combating poverty and promoting health.

With your support, Health GAP will continue the mixture of informed analysis, strategic campaigns and audacious goal-setting to overcome the challenges that lie ahead.

But we need your help now to take an advantage of this challenge grant opportunity. An individual donor has asked us to raise $25,000 by recruiting new donors and convincing existing supporters to double their contributions. If we succeed, this donor will match your donation, dollar for dollar through the challenge grant.

Although this is a difficult time for giving, we know you share our commitment to ensuring all people living with HIV/AIDS have access to life-saving medicines and that effective advocacy is required to hold governments accountable to this bold vision. We hope you become a new donor to Health GAP today, or increase your support if you are already one of our supporters, in order to leverage the dollar-for-dollar challenge grant.

Thank you.

Sincerely,