Since we started the Stephen Lewis Foundation six years ago, we've based our funding model on a simple, yet powerful idea: that when you put money directly into the hands of communities, great things happen.

We've worked to create a new way of funding that is sensitive, responsive and flexible - one that avoids bureaucratic red-tape and ensures that the money goes where it's most needed.

The grassroots organizations we work with are pioneering effective and sophisticated responses to HIV and AIDS in their communities. Since 2003, we've funded more than 300 grassroots projects in 15 countries to support the ordinary people - grandmothers, women and children - who have been affected by the AIDS pandemic. In country after country, we have seen lives and hope restored.

We see a potential for major change around the pandemic. Our challenge is clear: we must help effective projects to scale up, fund more innovative initiatives, and support the tremendous people who are working determinedly to turn the tide of AIDS right across the continent.

African communities know what needs to be done. What they need are the resources to make it possible.

Just think what increased support would mean:

• Hundreds of thousands more children would be able to attend school, access proper nutrition, and receive the counselling they need to cope with the loss of their parents. Last year alone, the foundation supported more than 200,000 orphans and vulnerable children.
• Grandmothers across Africa who are raising their orphaned grandchildren would have access to health care, nutritious food, emotional support, and the resources they need to plan for their grandchildren's future.
• More community health workers would be trained to travel from house to house to distribute medication, counsel families and nurse people too sick to leave home.
• A network of thousands of local leaders and people living with HIV and AIDS would be able to speak out against stigma and discrimination in their communities. Women who are victims of sexual violence would receive emergency reconstructive surgeries, HIV testing and care, counselling and vital psychological support.

Your support would mean communities transformed. Together, we can help turn the tide of AIDS in Africa.