YouthAIDS
 |
|
| Founder | Kate Roberts |
|---|---|
| Type | Educational charity |
| 56-0942853 | |
| Focus | HIV/AIDS |
| Location |
|
| Origins | Population Services International |
|
Area served
|
global |
| Services | humanitarian aid |
|
Key people
|
Ashley Judd |
| Website | psi |
YouthAIDS is an international nongovernmental, nonprofit education, funding, and health initiative of Population Services International (PSI) that provides humanitarian assistance and brings global awareness to the proliferation of HIV/AIDS. The organization is based in Washington, D.C. and reaches out to 600 million youth (ages 15–24) in over 60 countries through the delivery of information, products, and social services. Methods used to address issues include film, television, and radio; celebrity spokespersons; pop culture initiatives; theatrical productions; music; and sports. Actress and humanitarian Ashley Judd serves the organization as their Global Ambassador.
Population Services International and YouthAIDS partners with nongovernmental organizations and corporate entities throughout the world to develop HIV/AIDS training and awareness programs, along with opportunities for humanitarian service on global scale. Each year, YouthAIDS honors individuals that have provided exceptional humanitarian service that brings awareness to the reality of HIV/AIDS. Past recipients of the YouthAIDS Outstanding Achievement Award have included Sir Richard Branson, Sir Elton John, Annie Lennox, Judy McGrath, Nancy Pelosi, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Senator Mary Landrieu, Senator Richard Lugar, and Bob Geldof.
In the early 1990s, YouthAIDS founder, Kate Roberts, moved to Moscow, where she focused on launching the Russian version of Cosmopolitan Magazine. Her work took her to Romania, where she created a global HIV/AIDS prevention marketing campaign that, Roberts said, "increased condom use by 100 percent in the first year". In 1999, while on vacation in South Africa, Roberts became aware of the high mortality rate in the country, due to HIV/AIDS. One in four girls in the country were found to have contracted HIV or AIDS by age 14. Roberts recognized that the strategies that she had put in place in her Romanian campaign could be successfully applied on a global scale. In 2001, with a handful of PSI supporters, the YouthAIDS campaign was established as an initiative of Population Services International.
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