In the early 1980's HIV was a largely unknown disease. 

Dr Patrick Dixon began, in his work as a physician, to meet patients with HIV, who had been refused care at home, or in hospices because of fear and stigma.

As a result, ACET was born in 1988. Since then ACET has directly or indirectly touched the lives of millions of people.

ACET began providing home based and palliative care by trained volunteers, supported by a professional team, across Greater London, together with teams going into schools with life-saving messages. 

Other home care and schools teams soon developed around the UK, in Uganda, Thailand, Romania and other nations. 

Many of these teams have developed other services such as prevention of mother-to-child transmission, HIV testing, administration of therapy, support of orphans and vulnerable children, training and capacity-building of other AIDS organisations.

Eventually, and partly as a result of campaigning by ACET, the UK National Health Service took responsibility for most of the UK care work, and the focus of ACET today is international, with projects in over 20 nations, often working in remote rural communities.

ACET is still providing help in the UK - supporting workers in schools, training health care workers and others in Northern Ireland, while other ACET Alliance members provide community care, housing support and other services in the UK. 

An increasingly important part of ACET work is training people in other organisations to deliver high-impact HIV care and prevention programmes.

ACET provides training resources for community workers in many other nations - with distribution of over 350,000 free copies of the books AIDS and You, and AIDS Action, in over 23 languages, working in partnership with Operation Mobilisation.

ACET firmly believes that HIV can be beaten and looks forward to a world where it will just be a memory.