Christian aid agency Tearfund has launched an appeal to ensure people living with HIV are able to access vital antiretroviral (ARV) medication.
Around 33.2 million people across the world are currently living with HIV. Of these, 22.5 million live in sub-Saharan Africa.
ARVs are not a cure but can dramatically restore the health and strength of someone living with HIV, and extend their life by delaying the rate at which the virus replicates.
However, although the medicines are increasingly available for free in low-income countries, around seven in ten people who need them are still unable to access them.
Tearfund’s Alive appeal, launched to coincide with World AIDS Day on Monday, aims to tackle this injustice by mobilising churches across the UK to campaign and pray.
Across the world, Tearfund’s partner agencies are already inspiring and equipping church volunteers to help more people access ARV treatment.
“ARVs are a gift of God,” said one local church volunteer about how ARVs have changed the way the church in Gondola District, Mozambique, responded to HIV.
Before, local church volunteers helped people to die with dignity. Now they help them to live. With practical and emotional support from the volunteer and proper nutrition, ARV medicines can give people living in poverty with HIV many more years of healthy life, and prevent more children growing up as orphans.
Tearfund’s vision is to halt the spread of HIV and reverse the impact of AIDS by 2015 in the countries where we work.
