How to Survive a Plague is the inspirational story of two coalitions – ACT UP and TAG (Treatment Action Group) – who united, using activism and innovation, to turn AIDS from a death sentence into a manageable condition, as well as confronting attitudes of the time.

Despite having no scientific training, these self-made activists infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time. With remarkable access to never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and ’90s, filmmaker David France immerses the viewer in this very real struggle between set-back and breakthrough.