This document is about using the mass media effectively to inform and educate the general public about HIV and AIDS. However, as stated in the document, using the mass media effectively in the response to AIDS presents major challenges because sensitive health information and often difficult science have to compete for broadcast time and audiences with a myriad of other topics and interest groups, both commercial and non-commercial. Also, people from the very different worlds of the creative arts and science have to find a common vision and work together as equal partners. The document attempts to provide examples to support the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) request that mass media organisations put their energy into HIV and AIDS education.

There are many examples from around the world of people and organisations meeting these challenges. This report looks in detail at just a few (such as the Soul City entertainment-education programmes and Takalani Sesame), and focuses on the Republic of South Africa, which is home to the largest number of people living with HIV in the world (as stated in the report of December 2005). The purpose of the report is to describe the processes by which an original idea for using the mass media to address HIV and AIDS is put into practice, and to share the lessons learned with all those who wish to do something similar.

For this report, a UNAIDS consultant visited South Africa to interview a wide range of people working in the field, from project managers, researchers, and media executives, to film-makers, audience groups, and people living with HIV who present their own programmes. The aim was to find out not just what has to be done in practical terms, but to gain some insight into the satisfactions and frustrations of working in the challenging environment of the mass media, and to discover the secrets of survival and success. The organisations have very different histories, intended audiences, and ways of working, and ranges of experience.

For example, it looks at:

• how intended audiences are chosen;
• how partnerships are formed and decisions made;
• how topics are chosen and messages developed;
• the research process that underpins the production of materials; and
• what ethical issues are raised by addressing HIV and AIDS in the media, and how they are handled.