Our history

Find out:

• what the Trust is
• how we got our name
• how the charity has developed
• when THT was set up
• how we've joined with other organisations

What is Terrence Higgins Trust?

Terrence Higgins Trust is the UK’s leading HIV and sexual health charity, providing a wide range of services to over 50,000 people a year.  The charity also campaigns and lobbies for greater political and public understanding of the personal, social and medical impact of HIV and sexual ill health.

How did the charity get its name?

Terry Higgins was one of the first people in the UK to die with AIDS. He died aged 37, on 4 July 1982 in St Thomas' Hospital, London. By naming the Trust after Terry, the founder members, who were partner and friends, hoped to personalise and humanise AIDS in a very public way.

When was the charity set up?

In 1982, the Terry Higgins Trust was set up in 1982 by a friend of Terry’s, Martyn Butler, and Terry’s partner, Rupert Whitaker, with the intention of preventing others from having to suffer as Terry did; it focused on raising funds for research and awareness of the illness that was then called Gay-Related Immune Deficiency (GRID).

The following year, a public meeting about GRID was organised by London Lesbian and Gay Switchboard and the Terry Higgins Trust at which a small group of committed volunteers from a range of backgrounds came together; this included Tony Whitehead, who went on to become the Trust’s first chief executive.

In August of that year the Trust was reborn as a formal organisation, the Terrence Higgins Trust (THT), with a constitution and a bank account. By November 1983 it was a limited company with a Board of Directors, and by January 1984 had gained charitable status. It provided direct services immediately, including buddying/home-help, counselling, drug- and sex-education.

The Terrence Higgins Trust was the first charity in the UK to be set up in response to the HIV epidemic and has been at the forefront of the fight against HIV and AIDS ever since.

How the charity has developed

From its small beginnings in a flat in central London, THT has grown to become the UK's leading HIV and sexual health charity, and one of the largest in Europe. It has always been at the forefront of the fight against HIV and AIDS, and since it was formed, the needs of people living with, and affected by, HIV have been fundamental to its development.

The charity's roots were in the gay community and, for many years, the HIV epidemic in the UK affected mainly gay men. Nonetheless, we've always worked in an equal way with gay men, haemophiliacs, sex-workers, and drug-users from the start.

As the shape of the epidemic here has changed, so has THT. More African people living in the UK are diagnosed with HIV than gay men each year now, though the majority of new infections continue to be among gay men. So existing services have been developed and new services introduced to meet ever-changing needs.

But the involvement of people with HIV has remained constant, and volunteers and staff who are living with HIV have, and always will be, central to the charity.

In recent years, the charity has also developed sexual health services – firstly for people living with or at risk of HIV, and then more broadly for the general population, especially young people who are most at risk of sexual ill health. Again, the charity has grown and evolved in response to the needs of people using its services.

Partnerships and mergers

THT has a strong record of collaboration with other agencies in both the voluntary and statutory sectors, and believes very firmly in the benefits of partnership working. 

Since 1999, THT has merged with a series of other organisations, both in London and further afield, and now has around 300 staff and more than 800 volunteers. 

These mergers have brought with them a wealth of expertise and experience, enabled THT to provide services across England, Scotland and Wales, and strengthened its response to HIV and sexual ill health epidemics in the UK.