Advocacy by people living with and affected by HIV has been critical to the progress made the response to HIV since the beginning of the epidemic. Advocacy has sparked action in the face of denialism and indifference, mobilized unprecedented financial resources and enabled communities to participate in designing health services that meet their needs. When traditional policy- making processes stall due to bureaucracy, advocacy shines a light on the problem and leverages community power and political will to drive action and innovation. This is why AIDS advocates around the world remain a major force for an accelerated, more equitable scale-up of effective HIV and health programming.
