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The mission of the Global AIDS Alliance is to halt global HIV/AIDS and mitigate its impacts on poor countries hardest hit by the epidemic. Specifically, we are committed to pursuing advocacy to (1) achieve universal access to HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment, and care by 2010; (2) advance children's well-being, with a focus on prevention and treatment of pediatric HIV/AIDS, basic education, and care and support for orphans and vulnerable children; (3) advance women's equality, with a focus on integrating sexual and reproductive health and HIV services and preventing violence against women; and (4) secure increased financial resources and ensure they are utilized to maximize on-the-ground results.

Click here to download GAA's 2008-2010 strategic plan. 

Over the past year, we combined media outreach and public education with targeted coalition-building and grassroots mobilization in order to raise awareness and inspire activism in support of advocacy to advance these policy objectives. Following are highlights of GAA's program activities during 2007. Click here to download a complete summary GAA's 2007 accomplishments.

Achieving Universal Access by 2010

• GAA played a lead role in advocacy to ensure that UNAIDS produced resource need estimates that reflect the costs of achieving universal access to HIV/AIDS treatment by 2010.
• GAA's advocacy helped ensure that proposed House and Senate appropriations bills eliminated the requirement that the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) spend at least one-third of its HIV prevention budget on abstinence-until-marriage programs, and blocked amendments to the FY2008 foreign operations appropriations bill that would have eliminated a provision allowing the President to waive the abstinence-only earmark.
• GAA is playing a lead role in efforts to shape the PEPFAR reauthorization process to ensure that the next phase of the US global AIDS response advances a comprehensive prevention strategy.
• In December, GAA, the Kenya Treatment Access Movement, and Health GAP convened a meeting of 21 African civil-society advocates in Nairobi, Kenya, that produced a series of recommendations that have been welcomed by Capitol Hill staffers drafting PEPFAR reauthorizing legislation.
• GAA is supporting the African Health Capacity Investment Act of 2007, which requires the US to develop and fund a coordinated approach to help African countries strengthen health care systems and improve the training, retention, and support of health workers.
• GAA's advocacy helped shape the UK government's September 2007 announcement of a new International Health Partnership that will promote health system strengthening by supporting national efforts to achieve the health-related Millennium Development Goals.
• GAA is supporting efforts to persuade the Global Fund to institute a new grant application process that would allow country applicants to submit approved national strategies for scaling up an effective response to HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, or malaria.

Advancing Children's Well-Being

• In March 2007, GAA, Global Action for Children, and UNICEF co-convened an advocacy summit that led to the creation of a new advocacy platform to achieve universal basic education, accelerate youth HIV prevention, eliminate pediatric AIDS, ensure social protection for AIDS-affected and other vulnerable children, and mobilize financial resources.
• As a result of advocacy by GAA and others, several pediatric fixed-dose combination drugs were released over the past year, including important second-line drugs, and many more pediatric drugs have been approved for use by PEPFAR.
• After extensive lobbying by GAA and others, the International Drug Purchase Facility (UNITAID) awarded UNICEF and the World Health Organization $21 million over two years to support the acceleration of prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission programs.
• Thanks in large part to GAA's advocacy, the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator has agreed to launch a public-private initiative to accelerate the development of pediatric diagnostics in 2008.
• UNICEF has responded favorably to a proposed civil-society initiative to increase country-level demand for investments in pediatric treatment and PMTCT+ services through the Global Fund, and GAA will be advancing this concept in partnership with the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, Global Action for Children, and others.
• GAA remains the only AIDS organization working to revitalize the Fast Track Initiative, and continued to play a leadership role in efforts to mobilize increased resources and secure reforms that will make the FTI more effective and accountable.
• GAA's advocacy helped persuade Congress to link $265 million in possible education funding to the Fast Track Initiative and reaffirm its commitment to school fee elimination.
• GAA continued to support the School Fee Abolition Initiative spearheaded by UNICEF and the World Bank, and helped develop new operational guidelines for countries seeking to eliminate school fees.
• GAA helped secure a renewed congressional commitment to allocating 10% of PEPFAR's budget to OVC programs, which should result in over $400 million in funding during FY2008.

Advancing Women's Equality

• In partnership with Population Action International (PAI), Interact Worldwide, and the International Planned Parenthood Federation, among others, GAA undertook an expanded initiative to increase Global Fund investments in programs that integrate sexual and reproductive health and HIV services as part of the Fund's Round 8 grant-making.
• In September 2007, GAA and Interact Worldwide published a shadow report assessing six proposals to integrate SRH and HIV/AIDS services submitted as part of the Global Fund's Round 7.
• GAA helped persuade the Global Fund's board of directors to adopt a decision point on gender that will provide a framework for scaling up investments in initiatives to address gender issues, including SRH/HIV integration and gender-based violence.
• GAA helped ensure the inclusion of programs to address violence against women in UNAIDS costing estimates for the first time.
• GAA succeeded in joining the inner circle of advocates working on a Capitol Hill strategy to promote the International Violence Against Women Act.
• GAA published a September 2007 report highlighting the need to ensure that national education plans, donor governments, and multilateral agencies, including the Fast Track Initiative, address the problem of school-related violence.

Mobilizing Increased Resources and Ensuring Aid Effectiveness

• GAA's response to revised UNAIDS epidemiological estimates highlighted the need for increased funding to provide basic HIV/AIDS services to millions of people worldwide, and secured broad media coverage.• GAA's advocacy helped persuade Congress to boost global AIDS funding to $6.4 billion in fiscal year 2008, including $850 to $890 million for the Global Fund. • As part of the PEPFAR reauthorization debate, GAA is at the forefront of efforts to secure $50 billion in US global AIDS funding by 2013.
• Germany has committed €200 million over five years to support the Debt2Health initiative, including €50 million to convert debt owed by Indonesia into Global Fund-approved programs.
• As part of the 2008 presidential campaign, GAA helped advance a platform calling on the US presidential candidates to direct an additional 1% of the US budget to fighting AIDS and poverty, and we are leading efforts to create a new Cabinet-level, poverty-focused development agency.
• GAA coordinated a global petition urging G8 leaders to honor their commitments to increase aid levels, support the Global Fund, address the health worker shortage, and accelerate universal basic education.
• GAA's advocacy helped persuade the House of Representatives to adopt language restricting the International Monetary Fund's imposition of wage ceilings that restrict the ability of poor countries to invest additional resources in health and education programs.