Standing Up For Our Lives

Twenty years ago, a group of activists came together to demand access to treatment for all people living with HIV. 1 For a long time, getting HIV was seen as an “automatic death sentence.” 2 HIV/AIDS had devastated the African continent. South Africa, in particular, faced a spiralling epidemic: the number of people living with HIV had grown from 160 000 by 1990 to more than 4.2 million by 2000. 3 That year, the number of people living in South Africa dying in their 30s and 40s exceeded those dying in their 60s and 70s. 4

Learn more about the history of access to medicines in South Africa, and the critical work of civil society organisations in transforming the global conversation about drug pricing and reforming patent laws.