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Johannesburg, 25 April 2010 - UNAIDS Executive Director Mr Sidibe' joined South Africa's President Jacob Zuma, Minster of Health Dr Aaron Motsoaledi and Gauteng Premier Ms Nomvula Mokonyane for the launch of the world's largest HIV testing and counselling campaign at the Natalspruit hospital in Erkuhuleni, east of Johannesburg on 25 April.

The campaign, which hopes to test 15-million people by the end of June 2011, is aimed at providing antiretroviral drugs to 80% of South Africans in need of treatment.

The campaign's prevention drive includes an increase in the provision of male condoms from 450-million to more than 1,5-billion condoms.

Mr Sidibe' commended President Zuma and Minister Motsoaledi for their leadership and commitment to the HIV response in South Africa and for the unprecedented mobilization of South Africans to test for HIV. This campaign "is the biggest national mobilization in South Africa around any one single issue since the end of apartheid", said Sidibe'. "Testing 15 million people by the end of 2011 is the largest programme scale up in the world we have seen so far. It is historic".

Mr Sidibe and Minister Motsoaledi took an early morning jog and later joined President Zuma, government officials and representatives of civil society in delivering keynote speeches. The launch also included performances by South African artists Choome, Arthur Mofokate and Ihashi Elimhlophe who sang songs carrying messages on the importance of people getting tested.

In his address, President Zuma disclosed his negative HIV status and encouraged South Africans to test regularly without however being obliged to disclose their status. "Anyone's HIV status is private and confidential. Disclosure is an individual decision. We must respect the decisions of those who choose to keep their status confidential, whether positive or negative," he said.

President Zuma said that the testing and counselling drive is aimed at changing attitudes and lifting the stigma attached to HIV. "We have to work harder, together, to fight the perceptions and the stigma, he said. "We have to make all South Africans understand that people living with HIV have not committed any crime, and that they have rights like any other citizen".

South Africa has the world's largest population of people living with HIV; an estimated 5.7 million people in the country are living with HIV, representing nearly one sixth of the global disease burden. Approximately18% of adults in South Africa are infected with HIV.