But HIV can be part of anyone’s story. And in 2015, Loveurself, a small non-profit organization which offers free testing, sought to get this message across. How? Though majority of Filipinos ignored the disease, we utilized one thing people couldn’t ignore online: TYPOS.

With a simple script we infected the most popular articles and sites, adding an “H” to any word with the letters “IV” or a “V” to any letter sequence of “HI”.

In effect, a single article could contain over 20 typos reading “HIV”. We utilised influencer tweets in the same way and even allowed people to HIVfy any site simply by inputting its url. And as they scrolled to comment about the typos, the message hit them, HIV could be part of anyone's story.

The link then led them to information on how to get free testing, counselling and even connect to an entire community for support.

In less than a week, the campaign had garnered over 50 million impressions and $500,000 in earned media. Most importantly though, Loveurself had reported a 60% rise in the number of people tested, making 2015 the year with the highest HIV testing rate in our history.

We launched the campaign in the country's most popular news site, Rappler.com, a site known for its accuracy in news and grammar. The articles were amplified by influencer tweets highlighting the many TYPOS.

In the span of just 6 short years, HIV cases in the Philippines grew by a whopping 1038%. This led the World Health Organization to identify the country as having the fastest growing AIDS epidemic in the world. And it could be traced back to a single problem: people simply weren’t getting themselves tested thinking they were impervious to the disease.