AIDS Task Force
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Mission Statement
Founded in 1985, The IATF is the only non-profit organization working on the national level. The organization was founded by HIV positive people in a time that being infected was equal to death. After evolvement, IATF nowadays protects and promotes the personal interests of people living with HIV (PWHIV) as well as advocating for public and institutional references to PWHIV as a group, together with providing cutting-edge psycho-social support services to PWHIV. We also work to prevent new infections among at-risk groups and among the general population.
About This Cause
Objectives: • To prevent new HIV infections in Israel and promote a national policy and the allocation of adequate national resources for this purpose. • To protect the rights, interests, life expectancy, and quality of life of people living with HIV in Israel as a group, and in certain cases also protecting individual concerns. • To work for a supportive and accepting society for people living with HIV in Israel. • To conduct, promote, and encourage basic and clinical research on HIV/AIDS, and on the factors that contribute to the spread of the disease in Israel. • To operate an HIV testing program, including rapid and anonymous testing. Past successes of the organization include: -Following IATF's request, the former Israeli Minister of Health, issued a statement condemning doctors and dentists who discriminate against HIV+ patients. The statement was issued following IATF's proof of the phenomenon of dentists who refuse to treat HIV+ people in their clinics. -IATF was the entity which initiated legal proceedings against the Israeli Ministry of Health (MOH) in the court system against its original refusal to include HAART medication in the national health insurance plan. Following the lawsuit, the situation has changed, and every HIV+ Israeli citizen is entitled to subsidized HAART medication. -IATF staff is routinely consulted by governmental entities on matters of HIV/AIDS due to its years-long experience and in depth knowledge. - IATF was the first to supply HAART medication to status-less HIV+ migrants in the country, who had no insurance and were under life threatening situations. Last year, after intensive lobbying by IATF, the MOH agreed to take responsibility of a portion (around 150) of such status-less HIV+ migrant population. IATF is pressing for the expansion of the MOH program. -IATF petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court regarding MOH's lingering in opening an IVF center for women who are HIV+ and wish to get pregnant and give birth to healthy children. Such center was opened in Rambam (Haifa) Hospital following IATF's petition. Despite significant progress in our scientific understanding of AIDS over the past decades, news of infection with HIV continues to have devastating effects on the lives of hundreds of Israelis every year. They join thousands of others whose lives had been profoundly altered as a result of living with HIV. Moreover, recent years have seen a sharp increase in the number HIV infections among young Israelis (ages 25 and under), especially at risk youth. The greatest difficulties often arise from the psychological strains and the social alienation it imposes on PWHIV. Many of them belong to underprivileged groups in Israeli society such as refugees, migrant workers, youth at risk, and men who have sex with men, who usually lack the awareness of its implications as well as the means to treat them. IATF’s current array of services include anonymous rapid HIV testing; mobile outreach services; MSM prevention; PLWHIV support services; prevention and support among Ethiopian immigrants community; educational workshops; young people at risk prevention project; prison education program; humanitarian project for asylum seekers and Trafficking victims; psychosocial services for PLWHIV including relatives and drug users harm reduction services.