When Jim Kim, Senior Advisor to the Director General of the World Health Organization. spoke in Bangkok about AIDS, he touched on many familiar refrains: challenges, goals, progress and needs. He also touched on one refrain new to my ear: opportunity. AIDS, in all of its devastation, offers an opportunity to address many issues in healthcare that have been neglected for decades. Because of AIDS, health centers are being built, health providers are being trained, healthcare finance is being restructured -- it's a long, long list reflected in the many diverse topics discussed at Bangkok. Jim speaks not only with credible credentials (Harvard training, co-founder of Partners in Health, recent MacArthur Grant winner), but with the experience of tackling TB for years in many difficult environments. He has seen that seemingly intractable problems can be addressed with new resolve, and AIDS is providing exactly that resolve to the international community, and as such, an impressive new opportunity.