27 Million Lives have been saved from AIDS since PEPFAR AND THE GLOBAL FUND WERE established in 2003
If 27 million people held hands, they would wrap around the whole earth.
The Faith Community was key in supporting PEPFAR and the Global Fund,
and now we are calling back out to them to help sustain the effort.
Watch the following videos to learn more:
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ABOUT THE PROJECT
27 Million Lives is a documentary and short video project that explores the faith community's dedicated action and firm commitment to see the PEPFAR initiative enacted into law and successfully implemented around the globe.
The President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) is one of the most significant and successful bi-partisan initiatives of the past fifty years. In 2003, the year PEPFAR was implemented, only 50,000 of the nearly 30 million Africans suffering from HIV were receiving the medication they needed to save their lives. Today, PEPFAR is treating more than 14 million people globally. PEPFAR has also helped more than 2.2 million babies born to HIV- positive mothers stay HIV-free and has provided aid to over 6.4 million children and caregivers affected by the virus.
When President Bush announced his PEPFAR initiative in his 2003 State of the Union address, he called for PEPFAR to devote $15 billion over five years to respond to the AIDS crisis. PEFPAR funds provided medical care and anti-retroviral treatment to more than 10 million people suffering from AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean, as well as assistance for children who were orphaned when AIDS took their parents.
Early in 2001, the United States pledged $200 million to AIDS relief through The Global Fund at the United Nations. The following year, that pledge exceeded $400 million. However, President Bush believed that the UN fund was not sufficient in and of itself and that more resources were needed to adequately address the crisis. With their combined efforts and complementary endeavors, PEPFAR and The Global Fund provide a comprehensive approach to the eradication of AIDS.
Bush remarked that “in the face of preventable death and suffering, we have a moral duty to act, and we are acting.” A number of faith-based organizations took that moral duty to heart. In many ways, the breadth of PEPFAR’s success, as well as the very shape of the program itself, owes much to the advice and support provided by those faith-based organizations and the faith community at large.