This blog was written by Wendy Dimas
It’s a dedicated sort of person who is thinking about World AIDS Day 2018 ahead of December 1st. As ONE members, that’s who we are. We are the group who enjoys our time with friends and family while working for a world without HIV/AIDS.
So while your song of choice blares in the background, here is refresher on the global fight against HIV/AIDS and a preview on how you can engage your congregation this year on December 1st for World AIDS Day!
For World AIDS Day, we are inviting congregations to partner with us in action. With the help of congregations, we can protect the gains that have been made against HIV/AIDS through programs like the PEPFAR and the Global Fund.
In 2004, President George W. Bush created the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) To this day, PEPFAR continues to be important in our efforts to end AIDS. Thanks to this program, HIV/AIDS went from being a death sentence for over 7,397 people daily to a manageable disease. Medications that for so long had been out of reach were now within sight, creating a new opportunity for life.
To date, PEPFAR remains the largest investment to fight a single disease in human history. Along with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (known as the Global Fund) and contributions from the affected countries, we’ve seen AIDS-related deaths drop by 47%.
Though this is a remarkable achievement that we can celebrate, there’s still work to be done. AIDS continues to remain a threat. If commitment to the fight against AIDS is retracted, the progress that has been made will be lost. It’s crucial that we keep pressing forward.
Our hope is that we will be inspired to use what’s in our hands, so that we can be good stewards of the time and place that we have been entrusted with. There are a few ways that we can achieve this.
To start, we are inviting you to pray with us. As people of faith, we believe prayer is important. Our hope is that our prayers affect us, those who are impacted by HIV/AIDS, and those who do the good work of serving those with HIV/AIDS.
Together, we can also write letters to respectfully remind our Members of Congress of the moral leadership that PEPFAR and the Global Fund represents to the 2,739 people who continue to die daily from HIV/AIDS.
Click here to activate your congregation and join the fight to end AIDS. We will send you the resources you need to mobilize your community of faith on behalf of the 15 million people with HIV who still can’t get life-saving medication.
The figures are daunting, but the solution can come by way of our prayers and our actions. Let’s trust God with His part, and do what we can with what is in front of us. Let’s move beyond imagining a world without AIDS to creating it.
