AID FOR AIDS (AFA) is committed to improving the quality of life of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) in developing countries and immigrants in the United States. We work to empower PLWHA, their caregivers, and the community at large by providing access to medication and education, by promoting prevention and advocacy, and by fostering leadership and capacity building.

Description and/or History:
AFA is among the world’s leading AIDS nonprofits providing free HIV medications and critical support to underserved populations throughout the developing world. During 2005 alone, well over $4 million dollars worth of antiretrovirals and other drugs of vital importance were sent to people living with HIV/AIDS in 27 countries. In addition, thousands of individuals in five Latin American and Caribbean nations receive a host of support services every year to help them manage the difficulties of living with this potentially deadly condition. In New York City, AFA offers a unique program in collaboration with more than 20 nonprofit partners to help HIV-positive immigrants’ secure decent healthcare and attain stability so that they can build healthy, productive lives in the United States.
A Brief History
It was a summer day in 1996. An elderly Venezuelan woman had sold everything, including her cemetery plot, to buy a ticket to New York to seek out a fellow Venezuelan who, she had heard, was working at St. Vincent’s Hospital and helping people with AIDS. Thanks to the availability of antiretroviral drugs, people in the United States were living with, not dying from AIDS. It was not so in her country.

She had risked everything to find him

The man this woman sought was Jesús Aguais. She told him that her son and daughter-in-law had the virus. They had no money for medication. She had risked everything to find him. Profoundly moved by her story, her love for her family, and her courage in taking so huge a risk on the merest hope, Jesús gave her the medications. He has kept in touch with her and her family ever since. That woman’s plight drove Jesús to action.
He knew all too well what HIV-positive people in his homeland faced on a daily basis: stigma and discrimination, nonexistent services, lack of information, inaccessibility of treatment, and the terrible, prohibitive cost of the drugs. One month’s supply is often six times what a Venezuelan earns in a month. Determined to do something about the situation, Jesús founded AID FOR AIDS (AFA) two months later.

In 1996, the nonprofit organization recycled lifesaving medications to 20 people.
From that date to this, it has helped more than 3,000 people in 27 countries on 5 continents. AFA has made some truly remarkable achievements.

Contact person: Tobey Busch, Program Director, (212) 337-8043, (email)

Address:

120 Wall Street, 26th Floor NY, NY 10005 (See a map)

Directions:

Nearest Metro/Subway Stop: Wall Street stop on subways,   Walk distance (in minutes): 5 minutes