Hally Mahler, HIV Department Director and EpiC Project Director, FHI 360
Kenisha Jefferson, Technical Advisor, FHI 360, Washington, DC

December 1^st is a day to reflect and raise awareness on the HIV epidemic. This year’s World AIDS Day theme, Let Communities Lead, focuses on the essential and central role of communities in ending HIV as a public health threat by 2030. Communities are essential in promoting HIV prevention, facilitating testing, and helping people living with HIV stay on treatment. They deliver essential HIV services, reaching those that public sector and donor-driven programs often cannot. But, as highlighted in this DevEx article authored by FHI 360’s HIV team, communities must also have a place at the decision-making table, access to funding to grow and determine their own priorities, and supportive allies invested in their leadership.   

The FHI 360 team, through the Meeting Targets and Maintaining Epidemic Control (EpiC) Project and other collaborations will continue to support the elevation of community leadership to amplify their voices and support their agency in the years to come. This commitment is underscored in the following webinars, stories, and resources produced over the past year.  

Webinars

• Becoming a USAID Prime Recipient: Experiences from Local and Key Population-led Organizations 
• Shifting power: The experience of three development organizations 

Resources

• A Primer on Sustainable Funding Models for Civil Society Organizations Supporting the HIV Response  
• Security Toolkit: Protecting implementers and improving programme outcomes 
• Injectable PrEP: A Factsheet for MSM Advocates and Community Members in the Asia-Pacific Region 
• Injectable PrEP: A Factsheet for Transgender and Gender-Nonbinary Advocates and Community Members in the Asia-Pacific Region 

Success Stories

• ENDA Santé Is Building an Enabling Environment for Key Populations in West Africa Based on Universal Human Rights 
• Preparing for Prime: Local Partner Knowledge Exchange on Managing Direct Funds 

Blogs

• New e-Pharmacy Improves Access to Lifesaving Medicines and Creates an Innovative Business Model for a Community-Led Organization in India 
• Kazakhstan’s first community-based pre-exposure prophylaxis program allows for flexibility and options 

Featured photo: Thong Le Hoa (in blue shirt), a dedicated outreach worker from The Sun Social Enterprise, providing one-on-one HIV prevention counseling during a community event in Kien Giang, Vietnam (Nov 2023). The Sun is receiving funds from the Government of Kien Giang to provide outreach, testing, and HIV referral services under the national social contracting pilot supported by USAID via the Meeting Targets and Maintaining Epidemic Control (EpiC) project. (Photo credit: Do Hoang Viet, freelancer).