The Global Media AIDS Initiative (GMAI) is an umbrella organization that unites and motivates media companies around the world to use their influence, resources, and creative talent to address AIDS. The GMAI creates a framework for sharing television and radio programming among media companies in order to increase public health messaging. The organization also educates journalists, editors and producers on how to cover the issue. HIV is preventable, and GMAI members aim to improve public awareness and knowledge to help stem the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Within the GMAI, there are five national and regional coalitions of media companies. As of July 2009, the media initiatives in Africa, Asia, Russia, Latin America and the Caribbean included over 300 member broadcasters total. The GMAI was conceived and organized by the Kaiser Family Foundation and UNAIDS with financial support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Ford Foundation and the Elton John AIDS Foundation.
The mission of the GMAI is to leverage the power of media to help prevent the spread of HIV and reduce the stigma facing those already living with the disease.[ citation needed ]
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan convened a meeting in New York in January 2004 to launch the GMAI. At the meeting, the Secretary-General asked the executives of 20 media corporations from 13 countries to pledge their companies’ commitment and resources to raising the level of public awareness and understanding about AIDS. [ citation needed ]
By the Spring of 2005, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan decide to hand over the leadership of the GMAI to media leaders, as envisaged by its founders. The transfer of leadership was made official during a second GMAI Summit at the annual MIP TV festival in Cannes, France. Bill Roedy, Vice Chair of MTV Networks and President of MTV Networks International, took over as Chairman. Bill Roedy formed the Leadership Committee of media executives to oversee the GMAI. Over the next 18 months, he challenged media companies on five fronts, including a commitment to airtime of HIV prevention messages, production of content offered right-free and cost-free, appropriate messaging tailored for local audiences, a workplace policy and an active partnership.[ citation needed ]
In December 2006, Bill Roedy handed over the chair of the GMAI Leadership Committee to Dali Mpofu, former CEO of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC). Today, implementing partners from each of the GMAI's five regional partnerships coordinate and oversee the GMAI.
Since its first inauguration, regional coalitions have been forming within the GMAI. The regional coalitions produce and share culturally relevant public service announcements, news, and entertainment programming on HIV/AIDS. Campaigns include not only radio and television pieces, but a range of platforms like consumer product labeling, billboard advertising, and mobile phone messaging. Many coalitions also provide training for media representatives in their region.[ citation needed ] Below are the official links to these campaigns.
The British Medical Journal published an article on determining the most cost and health effective way of treating HIV patients and preventing further spread of HIV (Hogan, D.R., et al., 2005). The article concluded that the most cost-effective way of reducing HIV transmission could be using mass media campaigns - reaching the greatest number of people using the lowest budget (Hogan, D.R., et al., 2005). Using the power of the media, the GMAI can be a significant contributor to preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS.
The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS) is the main advocate for accelerated, comprehensive and coordinated global action on the HIV/AIDS pandemic.
The XV International AIDS Conference was held in Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand, from July 11 to July 16, 2004. The main venue for the conference was the IMPACT Muang Thong Thani convention centre at Nonthaburi, north-east of downtown Bangkok. It was the first international AIDS conference to be held in Southeast Asia. International AIDS conferences have been held regularly since the first one in Atlanta in 1985.
Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul is a German politician and a member of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) since 1965.
The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) is a global not-for-profit, public-private partnership working to accelerate the development of vaccines to prevent HIV infection and AIDS. IAVI researches and develops vaccine candidates, conducts policy analyses, serves as an advocate for the HIV prevention field and engages communities in the trial process and AIDS vaccine education. The organization takes a comprehensive approach to HIV and AIDS that supports existing HIV prevention and treatment programs while emphasizing the need for new AIDS prevention tools. It also works to ensure that future vaccines will be accessible to all who need them.
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is an international financing and partnership organization that aims to "attract, leverage and invest additional resources to end the epidemics of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria to support attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals established by the United Nations". This multistakeholder international organization maintains its secretariat in Geneva, Switzerland. The organization began operations in January 2002. Microsoft founder Bill Gates was one of the first donors to provide seed money for the partnership. From January 2006 it has benefited from certain US Privileges, Exemptions, and Immunities under executive order 13395, which conferred International Organizations Immunities Act status on it.
KFF, also known as The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, is an American non-profit organization, headquartered in San Francisco, California. It prefers KFF since its legal name can cause confusion as it is no longer a foundation or a family foundation, and is not associated with Kaiser Permanente. KFF focuses on major health care issues facing the nation, as well as U.S. role in global health policy. KFF claims that it is a non-partisan source of facts and analysis, polling and journalism for policymakers, the media, the health care community, and the general public, and its website has been heralded for having the "most up-to-date and accurate information on health policy" and as a "must-read for healthcare devotees."
The Commission on HIV/AIDS and Governance in Africa (CHGA) was convened in 2003 by then UN Secretary General Kofi Annan under the leadership of Wilson Center Senior African Policy Scholar K. Y. Amoako, then the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
Awa Marie Coll-Seck is as Senegalese infectious diseases specialist and politician who served as Minister of Health of Senegal from 2001 to 2003 and again from 2012 to 2017. She also served as former Executive Director of the Roll Back Malaria Partnership and is on the board of directors of several notable global health organizations. She is an agenda contributor of the World Economic Forum.
The Mo Ibrahim Foundation was established in 2006.
The very high rate of HIV infection experienced in Uganda during the 1980s and early 1990s created an urgent need for people to know their HIV status. The only option available to them was offered by the National Blood Transfusion Service, which carries out routine HIV tests on all the blood that is donated for transfusion purposes. The great need for testing and counseling resulted in a group of local non-governmental organizations such as The AIDS Support Organisation (TASO), Uganda Red Cross, Nsambya Home Care, the National Blood Bank, the Uganda Virus Research Institute together with the Ministry of Health establishing the AIDS Information Centre in 1990. This organization worked to provide HIV testing and counseling services with the knowledge and consent of the client involved.
Youthforce was an international youth network founded in 1999 to raise visibility around the impact of HIV/AIDS on youth.
Seth Franklin Berkley is an American medical epidemiologist, the CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and a global advocate of the power of vaccines. He is the founder and former president and CEO of the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI).
The first HIV/AIDS cases in Nepal were reported in 1988. The HIV epidemic is largely attributed to sexual transmissions and account for more than 85% of the total new HIV infections. Coinciding with the outbreak of civil unrest, there was a drastic increase in the new cases in 1996. The infection rate of HIV/AIDS in Nepal among the adult population is estimated to be below the 1 percent threshold which is considered "generalized and severe". However, the prevalence rate masks a concentrated epidemic among at-risk populations such as female sex workers (FSWs), male sex workers (MSWs), injecting drug users (IDUs), men who have sex with men (MSM), Transgender Groups (TG), migrants and Male Labor Migrants (MLMs) as well as their spouses. Socio-Cultural taboos and stigmas that pose an issue for open discussion concerning sex education and sex habits to practice has manifest crucial role in spread of HIV/AIDS in Nepal. With this, factors such as poverty, illiteracy, political instability combined with gender inequality make the tasks challenging.
United Nations Security Council resolution 1308, adopted unanimously on 17 July 2000, was the first resolution to address the impact of HIV/AIDS worldwide. The Security Council asked countries to consider voluntary HIV/AIDS testing and counselling for troops deployed in peacekeeping operations.
loveLife is a youth focused HIV prevention initiative in South Africa.
The Elena Pinchuk ANTIAIDS Foundation is the first and only charity foundation in Ukraine that is privately funded. The main aim of the Foundation is to control the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Ukraine.
Founded in 1999, Alliance India is a non-governmental organisation operating in partnership with civil society, government and communities to support sustained responses to HIV in India that protect rights and improve health. Complementing the Indian national programme, we build capacity, provide technical support and advocate to strengthen the delivery of effective, innovative, community-based HIV programmes to vulnerable populations: sex workers, men who have sex with men (MSM), transgender people, hijras, people who inject drugs (PWID), and people living with HIV.
Elhadj As Sy is a Senegalese humanitarian aid expert who served as the Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) from 2014 until 2019.
Volodymyr Zhovtyak is a Ukrainian social activist and a human rights defender. He is one of the leaders of the movement of people living with HIV/AIDS in Ukraine, and in the region of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. He is one of the founders of the national and international non-governmental organizations of PLWH, which collaborates with institutions of the United Nations, the European Union and the USA, as well as with the Cabinet of Ministers and the Presidential Administration of Ukraine.
Tlaleng Mofokeng is a South African physician who is the United Nations' Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health. She campaigns for universal health access and HIV care. She was named as one of the BBC's 100 Women in 2021.