VIHDA was founded in June 2006 by Humberto Mata (b.1968, Guayaquil, Ecuador, Harvard University 1990, Wharton MBA 1997) and Maximiliano Novoa (b.1979 Buenos Aires, Argentina)  to work mostly in the prevention of vertical (mother-to-child) transmission of HIV/AIDS.  Our work began conducted mostly in the largest Maternity Hospital in the country, located in Guayaquil, Ecuador's largest city (pop. 2'500.000), where about 35,000 births per year take place (about 20% of all births in the country).      

To meet the first challenge we are increasing the importance of outreach and HIV awareness with other organizations that work with women in low income communities and help raise the awareness of the importance of prenatal care and specifically of HIV tests during pregnancy.  The second challenge has led us to start our own day clinic (which opened in July 2009) to work with people who live with HIV/AIDS and give them access to expert health professionals, psychologists and counselors, as well as a welcoming and friendly environment to meet with their health professionals.

To fight vertical transmission of HIV Fundación VIHDA signed a 3-way agreement with the Maternity Hospital Sotomayor, which is privately run, and with the Ministry of Health so that together we could provide access to HIV tests, ARV medication, trained health professionals and provide HIV testing services with pre and post test counseling to more than 32,000 pregnant women per year.     

We believe this is a good example of private-public partnerships to combat HIV transmission.  Fundación VIHDA receives all of its donations from private donors and from conducting our own fundraising activities, but have been able to partner up with national and local government to achieve our goals of stopping vertical transmission and provide better care for people living with HIV/AIDS.    

• Since January 2007, when our program in the Maternity Hospital began, until December 31, 2009, we have counseled and done 104,226 HIV tests to pregnant women getting their pre-natal care or getting checked into the hospital to give birth.   
• Of those 104,226 HIV tests, we have detected 485 positive cases, or a 0.50% incidence rate (equivalent to 1 in every 200 pregnant women).   
• Monthly average of detected cases has increased from 12 per month in 2007 to 15 cases per month in 2009.
• All 485 detected cases have received successful ARV therapy (women before birth, babies after birth).
• 100% of the babies born within the program and who have reached 18 months (when final negative diagnosis is given) are HIV-free.
• Still since 2007, four babies have been born with HIV to women who arrived to give birth in advanced labor and who had not received any prenatal care whatsoever.   The challenge remains to encourage women to ALWAYS get prenatal care and include HIV in their lab tests.

Fundacion VIHDA was founded in June, 2006, for a very simple reason: Ecuador seemed to be on the verge of an explosion of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The year before Fundación VIHDA was founded, UNICEF published a report indicating that Ecuador's infection rates were comparable to those of Africa and the Caribbean fifteen years earlier. Without intervention, it looked as if Ecuador was headed for a future with infection rates similar to those regions of today. Fundación VIHDA began with the goal of avoiding this terrible fate.

During his 20th Exeter reunion in 2006,HumbertoMata ’86 decided it was time to give back. Listening to several classmates describe how they changed careers to work in nonprofit, educational and social services fields,he was inspired.After 18 years in finance and small business, Mata wanted to focus on a cause that mattered to him and his community.

Growing up in Ecuador and the United States in the 1980s and 1990s, he witnessed friends and classmates test positive for HIV and eventually perish from AIDS because there were no approved or effective medications at the time. “I always thought that someday I would try to do something about it and the rising epidemic worldwide,” he says.