AIDS is no longer a death sentence. Just 2 pills a day is all it takes to turn a life around - to bring someone who is at death’s door back to full health, back to a full life. Doctors call it “The Lazarus Effect.”

It’s the result of antiretroviral therapy (ARV) – a medication that helps stop the HIV virus from progressing in to full blown AIDS. This HIV treatment allows people to get on with their lives; support their families, raise their children, attend school – become active members of their communities again.

Once a person begins HIV treatment, they must continue it for life: usually 2 pills a day, every day.

A little can make a big difference

Antiretroviral therapy (ART) costs around 40 cents a day. For millions of people in Africa this is more than they can afford yet without the medicine they cannot survive. Sub-Saharan Africa lost 1.5 million people to this preventable and treatable disease in 2007.

While there is no cure for AIDS, antiretroviral therapy is highly successful: after two years on treatment, eight out of every ten people are still alive. And for the countries battling the ravages of the disease, a simple response is working:

• Give access to antiretroviral therapy

• Launch clear and accurate prevention communication campaigns

• Provide HIV counseling and testing

• Help prevent mother-to-child transmission.

(RED) money, administered by the Global Fund, is used to finance this activity in Rwanda, Swaziland, Ghana and Lesotho.

The Global Fund – a vital part of the Solution

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria was created in 2002 to dramatically scale up the world’s response to these three diseases which claim millions of lives annually.

The Global Fund is an innovative partnership of governments, non-governmental organizations, and the private sector. It is not an implementing agency. The Global Fund relies on local ownership, planning and expertise and enables countries to design and execute their own programs, and provides funds only on the basis of proven results to agreed performance targets to ensure that funds are used efficiently to create real change for people and communities.

Global Fund financing is enabling more than 2 million HIV positive people to access lifesaving antiretroviral treatment around the world. Around 60% of all people receiving their ARV treatment in developing countries now do so as a result of Global Fund financing.