the person who has been leading that effort in the white house is jeff crowley, the director for office of national aids policy. jeff is absolutely one of the visionaries behind this document and now i would like to introduce him to talk a little bit more about it. jeff. [applause] >> good afternoon. thank you madam secretary. we clearly would not have got here today without your leadership and we thank you in your whole team at the department of health and human services for all the good you are doing. it also like to acknowledge my friend and colleague dr. howard koh. he helped us get to this point and i'm not sure he really understands what lays ahead for him because really his work is just beginning. we are investing a lot of reonsibility in him and his office to make sure we deliver the promise of the strategy. i would also like to express my deep appreciation for melody barnes. it is a gift for the hiv community that they president placed the policy within the domestic policy council. we could not produce a solid strategy i think we have o engagen the comprehensive ocess to get he

jeff crowley who is the director of the office of national aids policy you will hear from and also drard koh who is my terrific assistant and secretary on health who is charged with actually reading the department wide effort, localizing the all hands-on support for the initiative we are going to outline and i want to start by thanking the three of them because they do deserve a lot of credit for getting us to this spot today. as melody has already said, the plan is informed by not only those of you in the room but those from around the country who have worked in this area for years, who are providers and citizens living with hiv/aids, family members, advocates, faith-based communities represented and we wanted the most effective strategies and approaches so we needed to talk to the people who knew about that most effectively. and i again want to thank all the health development strategies. when president obama announced our plan to put together a comprehensive national hiv/aids strategy, he recognized that this actually is a critical turning point. in the 80's, when aids was first di