Jordan excelled in providing preventive and therapeutic interventions for HIV during the period 2004-2012, thanks to grants from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS. However, the cessation of these grants due to Jordan’s exclusion from eligibility, led to a large gap, especially in prevention services and reaching the most vulnerable groups. Awareness and education activities led by civil society also stopped, making it urgent for a civil society organization to assume this role and lead the national response to combat the virus. From here, the idea was born… FOCCEC was born, and the dream and the project began.
At first, we thought that we had all the expertise, understood all the needs, and were easily able to achieve our goals. But when we went out into the field, we discovered a completely different reality. We faced suffering that we had not imagined, difficulties that we had not anticipated, and challenges that we had not anticipated. We realized that it was not just about reaching people affected by the virus, raising their awareness, providing them with advice, and conducting tests, but rather involving them in drawing the roadmap. They know their needs best, so we listened to them, learned from them, and designed programs together. It was not just about providing services, but it turned into real community leadership, where the target groups played a pivotal role in guiding our work and developing our interventions.
Over time, we began to see the deep links between HIV and drug use, and between gender-based violence and reproductive and sexual health. We are no longer just an organization that provides HIV, reproductive health, and drug prevention services, but our role has expanded to working on the surrounding environment, to make it more supportive and empowering.
What started as a modest dream has today turned into a national and moral responsibility. Our commitment is no longer limited to providing services, but has become to build capacity, and strengthen partnerships with various sectors, locally, regionally, and internationally, to ensure an integrated and sustainable response. We work every day to fill a new gap, with one motto in mind:
"We succeeded, but there is more to achieve."
