PRNewswire - December 16, 2004

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Tides Foundation has been awarded a $1 million grant from the World Health Organization (WHO) in support of the Collaborative Fund for HIV Treatment Preparedness to support community-based HIV treatment education and advocacy projects around the world. This is the first time that WHO will directly fund community groups to support its goal of HIV treatment for 3 million people by the end of 2005.

The Collaborative Fund is a partnership between Tides Foundation and the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition (ITPC), an historic coalition of people living with HIV and their advocates, focused on securing quality HIV care and treatment. Coalition members include hundreds of representatives from the leading HIV treatment advocacy organizations around the world, including the Treatment Action Campaign in South Africa, the Thai Treatment Action Group in Thailand, the European AIDS Treatment Group, the International Community of Women Living with HIV, and RedLA in Latin America. To date, more than $3.4 million for the Fund has been raised with support from a growing number of donors including the Ford, Rockefeller and Stephen Lewis foundations, Open Society Institute and AIDS Fonds Netherlands.

Tides Foundation will facilitate the distribution of grants to regional networks and community-based organizations in Eastern Europe/Central Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and Africa. Regionally based Community Review Panels, comprised of ITPC members, will set funding priorities and recommend projects for funding through the review of grant applications. People living with HIV/AIDS make up the majority of those involved in setting funding priorities and selecting projects for funding.

"Empowering communities and community leaders is key in this effort," said Paisan Suwannawong of the Thai Treatment Action Group, who recently spoke at the Opening Ceremonies of the International AIDS Conference. "Treatment preparedness - defined as national and local advocacy to ensure equitable treatment access and treatment education to assist people in making and following through on treatment decisions - is an essential component of HIV care and treatment. These activities are as important as the pills themselves if we hope to realize the goals of making treatment available to the tens of millions of people who will need it over the coming years."

"The Collaborative Fund represents the first time that people fighting for HIV treatment around the world have come together to guide funding efforts. This fund utilizes the tremendous expertise and experience of people living with HIV/AIDS in addressing HIV care and treatment," said David Barr, Tides Foundation Senior Philanthropic Advisor.

The activities aim to give people currently taking or in need of antiretroviral treatment easy-to-understand information about issues such as how HIV works in the body, HIV testing, opportunistic infections, the different treatment types available and how they work, how to take treatment correctly and available support services. Advocacy activities include ensuring that treatment is available to all who need it, provision of high-quality, low-cost drugs, and overcoming the stigma and discrimination often faced by those living with and at-risk for HIV and AIDS.

"HIV treatment is effective, when it is available and used properly," said Nastya Kamlyk, of Positive Movement in Belarus. "But, too often, we hear from drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men who are denied treatment. This discrimination is not only inhumane, it serves to spread the threat of HIV further. Equitable treatment is not only fair, it is the only rational public health approach. The Collaborative Fund provides resources to meet this challenge."

About Tides Foundation

Since 1976, Tides Foundation has partnered with donors and institutions by offering donor-advised funds, philanthropic advice and management services for social change philanthropy. Tides is committed to strengthening community-based nonprofit organizations through national and global philanthropy -- creating a positive impact on people's lives in ways that honor and promote human rights, economic justice and a healthy, sustainable environment. Tides Foundation has a more than fifteen-year history of grantmaking in the area of HIV/AIDS treatment, prevention and education as well as early philanthropic efforts in the area of harm reduction and syringe exchange.

Contacts:

David Barr

Tides Foundation

646-602-0027 - d.barr@earthlink.net

Christopher J. Herrera

Tides Foundation

415-561-6355 - cherrera@tides.org

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SOURCE Tides Foundation

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PR041217

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