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About the Fund
The Collaborative Fund for HIV Treatment Preparedness – a global coalition for HIV treatment preparedness

The Collaborative Fund represents the first time that a global coalition of people living with AIDS has developed a funding mechanism that will allow them to set funding priorities and implement their strategies. Over 100 community-based and regional organizations around the world are already involved in Collaborative Fund activities, including:


  • Thai Treatment Action Group Treatment Action Group (South Africa)

  •  International Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS (ICW)

  • Vivo Positivo (Chile)

  • European AIDS Treatment Group

  • Indian Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS

  • Central/Eastern European Harm Reduction Network

  • Jamaican Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS

  • Podruga (Kyrgyzstan)

  • AIDS Care China

  • Gay Men’s Health Crisis (U.S.)

  • Zimbabweans Against HIV/AIDS

  • Lumiere Action (Cote d’Ivoire)


The Collaborative Fund is directed by those most vested in its success, People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). The Collaborative Fund is developed as a partnership with the membership of the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition (ITPC), comprised of leading treatment advocates and educators from around the world, and the Tides Foundation.

People living with HIV/AIDS are directly involved in leadership positions in all aspects of Collaborative Fund activities.  The people involved in shaping the priorities of the Collaborative Fund reflect a deep understanding of HIV treatment needs in every world region, and a commitment to advance HIV treatment while also advancing gender equality and the rights of women, youth, the poor, drug users, sex workers, men who have sex with men, prisoners, migrants and other vulnerable populations.

The direct involvement of people living with HIV/AIDS in policy and program development has been at the forefront of success in the fight against AIDS since the beginning of the epidemic. It is people living with HIV that developed harm reduction approaches, such as needle exchange programs, and other HIV prevention efforts, such as safer sex practices. People with AIDS around the world have developed the primary models for HIV advocacy, care and support. It is only through their courageous actions all over the world that we have made progress in overcoming discrimination and stigma associated with HIV.

Ultimately, the effectiveness of HIV treatment access efforts will depend on the ability of people living with HIV to overcome the stigma associated with HIV disease, access medicines and health care services in their communities, and understand how to make and follow through on treatment decisions. These activities, broadly defined as treatment preparedness, are as essential to success as the drugs themselves. They include:

  • National and regional advocacy: People living with HIV/AIDS have an important stake in the implementation of national health programs and government spending on HIV treatment, procurement and medicine importation policies.  As countries apply to and use the new funding mechanisms developed by the Global Fund for AIDS, Treatment and Malaria, the World Bank, WHO and others, community advocates should be involved in the development of funding applications, represented on Global Fund Country Coordinating Mechanisms (CCM), and involved in monitoring how the received funding is used. The Collaborative Fund supports these and other national and regional advocacy activities to secure medicine access, reduce medicine prices, and assure reliable and steady distribution of quality HIV treatment and other HIV-related therapies.

  • Community-based Advocacy:  Community-based programs led by people living with HIV/AIDS can help to overcome stigma, inform communities about the possibility of treatment and encourage HIV testing. The stigma against people living with HIV/AIDS, especially drug users, men who have sex with men, sex workers, migrants, ex-prisoners and other marginalized people, does not end at the entrance to the healthcare clinic. Community advocates can play major roles in overcoming gender bias in healthcare delivery and ensuring that all people with HIV are provided with, and have access to, comprehensive, high-quality and equitable information, treatment and care.

  • Treatment Literacy: As HIV treatment becomes available, people living with HIV need to understand how HIV treatment works, how to make decisions about whether to begin treatment, and how to follow through on those decisions. Proven models exist for peer-based, community-based treatment education and adherence support programs to help ensure that HIV medicines are used effectively. If not taken correctly, the virus will develop drug resistance, rendering treatment ineffective. Information about HIV testing and treatment options should reach people in their daily lives—through the educational system, the workplace and faith-based networks.

  • Integration of services for HIV treatment: Long-term treatment of HIV requires more than just medicines. To be effective, HIV care must be linked with quality diagnostic services, tuberculosis care, drug treatment programs, housing and nutrition services, legal services, mental health services and other relevant social services. Linking of services requires an investment in trained healthcare personnel and infrastructure. The Collaborative Fund supports the development of partnerships to ensure that these various services are linked to best meet the needs of people living with HIV/AIDS.


2006 Grants Summary Master List
2005 Grants Summary Master List