Several pivotal events and developments have changed the response to the global AIDS epidemic enormously since this Manual was last fully rewritten.

The Geneva World AIDS Conference in 1998 had as its slogan “Bridging the Gap” (presumably between rich and poor countries) but was marked largely by an appreciation of how big that gap was, with activists from the developed world finally facing the possibility of years of healthy living as their developed-world counterparts still battled with the devastation of AIDS.