On Sunday 19 May 2013, for the 30th time, grassroots organisations worldwide will commemorate International AIDS Candlelight Memorial. Communities will raise awareness around HIV, stand together with people living with HIV and remember the loved ones lost to HIV and AIDS. Read source

Widespread discrimination, stigma and violence against men who have sex with men and transgender people is holding back the HIV response. Read source

The Alliance is delighted to welcome AIDS Care China as our newest linking organisation. We look forward to building on the work of our previous country office in China to contribute to the HIV response in China. Read source

The UK government has this week announced that it is to cut direct aid to South Africa by 2015. Given that the Department for International Development’s priorities in the country in recent years have been to tackle HIV and to address maternal mortality, this is worrying news for the future of the epidemic there. Read source

As thousands of delegates travel to Malaysia to attend the 2013 Women Deliver conference at the end of this month, Shaleen - an outreach worker at a drop-in centre for sex workers – talks about the work she does to empower women to demand quality, user friendly integrated sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) and HIV services. Read source

This report summarises the results of site assessments on HIV and drug use in China, India, Indonesia, Kenya and Malaysia. The assessments were conducted by the International HIV/AIDS Alliance and their teams of experts in four technical areas:

• HIV prevention services for people who inject drugs
• HIV and drug-related policy and environment
• organisational development issues
• monitoring and evaluation of interventions.

The assessments were conducted to guide planning for the Community Action on Harm Reduction (CAHR) project, funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the government of the Netherlands and implemented by the International HIV/AIDS Alliance. The assessments focused on the Alliance’s lead partners in implementation of the CAHR project and also focused on the sub-recipients (implementing partners) of these five organisations, along with an in-country situation assessment.

Read more about the CAHR project here.

A new study, designed and carried out by the network of female sex workers in Latin America and Caribbean (REDTRASEX), has documented legislation that affects sex work - as well as detailing what this means in practice. Read source

This week the Alliance hosted a workshop to explore practical ways for our Linking Organisations to better understand their results. The participants were specifically tasked with developing a new set of indicators to measure the impact of Alliance programmes. Two workshop participants tell us what they had learnt. Read source

As the Global Fund to Fight to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and launches its fourth replenishment bid for US$ 15 billion, Members of the European Parliament, high level guests and community advocates spoke at an event at the European Parliament yesterday about the critical need to defeat the three diseases. Read source

As the Global Fund to Fight to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and launches its fourth replenishment bid for US$ 15 billion, Members of the European Parliament, high level guests and community advocates spoke at an event at the European Parliament yesterday about the critical need to defeat the three diseases. Read source

Yesterday’s announcement that the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is to target $15 billion to effectively fight the three diseases is a welcome one. There can be little doubt that the Global Fund has, in the words of Bill Gates, “started to change the trajectory of epidemics”. Read source

As the High Level Panel on the post-2015 framework prepares to submit its final report to the UN Secretary General, we outline our position on how to ensure progress on the HIV and related health needs of future generations. Read source

RedTraSex, the Latin American and the Caribbean network of sex workers, has launched a new report celebrating its 15th anniversary of campaigning for sex workers rights. Read source

Social protection is one of Stop AIDS Alliance’s (SAA) four thematic areas. Achieving social protection for people and households affected by HIV is a critical step towards the realisation of universal access to prevention, treatment, care and support. Evidence shows that HIV-sensitive social protection can reduce vulnerability to HIV infection, improve and extend the lives of people with HIV, and support individuals and households. Social protection plays a critical role in helping people overcome the structural inequalities that drive the HIV epidemic and that serve as barriers to treatment, testing, schooling and other essential services.

The UK government is to be applauded for holding firm on its longstanding commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of gross national income on aid, as announced in today’s budget. Read source

The Queen of England is signing the new Commonwealth Charter today. The Charter is the culmination of months of consultation and debate among State Members of the Commonwealth of Nations and has been agreed by consensus. Read source

Last week the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) announced a new collaboration with ViiV Healthcare - a joint venture of GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, and Shionogi - to work together to increase access to HIV medicines for children. We very much welcome the announcement as the initiative is an important step forward in improving treatment for children living with HIV. Read source

At the ongoing CROI conference (Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections), researchers from the University of Mississippi presented the case of an infant ‘functionally cured’ of HIV. This means that the HIV virus is no longer actively multiplying in the infant, who initially tested HIV-positive. Read source

Marcela Romero, Regional Coordinator of the Latin America and Caribbean Network of Transgender People (REDLACTRANS), fought for 10 years to be legally recognised as a woman in her country, Argentina. Read source

Ahead of International Women’s Day on 8 March, we highlight the horrific violence against transgender women across the world, and the disproportionately high rates of new HIV infections within this highly stigmatised community. Read source