On HIV Long-Term Survivors Awareness Day, meet Jeanette, a former MANNA client and HIV survivor! In this video, Jeanette and Emily Sadowy, MANNA's Manager of Nutrition & Client Services, share why nutrition is so valuable to clients facing HIV and AIDS.
For thousands of Philadelphians living with HIV, MANNA has been a faithful companion on the journey to survival.
June 5th marks the anniversary of the first officially reported cases of the disease that became known as AIDS in 1981. Today, June 5, is nationally recognized as HIV Long-Term Survivors Awareness Day (HLTSAD), a day to honor and celebrate the resilience, strength and empowerment of people who are surviving and thriving while living with HIV. For more than 36 years, MANNA has been part of the survivors' journey for thousands of people diagnosed with HIV and AIDS.
On this milestone day, we encourage you to make a gift to MANNA to honor the survivors we've nourished and to support our ongoing work providing delicious, medically tailored meals for Philadelphians living with HIV and AIDS.
Our work for clients living with HIV is in part federally funded through the Ryan White Program. That funding has been dependable for decades, but stories of federal and statewide cuts to HIV programming are mounting, meaning our community's support for clients with HIV/AIDS is more important than ever.
Your gift helps ensure MANNA's work for roughly 100 clients per month living with HIV will continue uninterrupted. Consider giving monthly to provide consistent, dependable funding for MANNA's work.
Learn more about HIV Long-Term Survivors Awareness Day
Established in 2014, HIV Long-Term Survivors Awareness Day (HLTSAD) is held each year on June 5, the anniversary of the first official reporting of what became known as the AIDS epidemic in 1981.
2026 is MANNA's third year recognizing HLTSAD. In 2024, our first year of the campaign, we shared a blog post, titled "We Were There Then, and We are Here Now." The post detailed MANNA's origins in 1990 and how we provided home-cooked meals for people with HIV and AIDS.
In 2025, we produced a video sharing scenes from MANNA's earliest days to demonstrate why HLTSAD means so much to us. The video was voiced by Jay Lassiter, a former MANNA client.