Decreased Funding Threatens HIV Progress
"As the economic downturn squeezes the health budgets of the world's poorest countries, efforts to tackle HIV and AIDS - particularly amongst those who are marginalized and discriminated against - are being hit hardest -as a consequence we face the very real prospect that progress on tackling HIV will go into reverse."
Britain's International Development Minister Gareth Thomas
There were two stories this week on funding shortfalls for global health, particularly for HIV/AIDS, and how this shortfall puts at risk the gains made so far in getting people on treatment and saving lives.
AlertNet: Funding squeeze threatens HIV progress, AIDS leaders warn
An estimated four million people around the world are currently on antiretroviral therapy (ART)--a 10-fold increase since 2003. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, in a recent press release, stated that transmission of the HIV virus from mothers to babies could be eliminated by 2015.
Despite these and many other successes, more progress needs to be made in HIV/AIDS care and treatment.
According to the WHO there are still 5 million people worldwide who don't have access to the life-prolonging treatment, plus there are more than 20 million HIV-positive people who don't need treatment now, but will in the future.
In the face of the continued economic downturn, nations are not living up to their financial pledges to fight HIV/AIDS, and are not on track to provide treatment to all who need it.
In London, the British government convened an "emergency meeting" to reinvigorate international efforts to fight the pandemic.
The British government urged countries in the G8 group of industrialized nations to live up to their financial pledges to the Global Fund and called on other G20 countries, including emerging economies, to put money into the fund.
This article also mentions that, according a recent Global Fund analysis of projected funding scenarios, $20 billion is needed from 2011-2013 to accelerate progress toward the health-related Millenium Development Goals. (By comparison, $10 billion was provided by donor countries for the 2008-2010 replenishment period. Obama's budget request for 2010 decreased the U.S. contribution to the Global Fund from $1 billion in 2009 to $900 million in 2010.)
IRIN PlusNews: Funding shortfalls foil new treatment guidelines
Those working to combat HIV/AIDS face the challenge of trying to implement the new WHO recommendations for earlier treatment with better AIDS drug cocktails, as donors seem to be rowing back from their promises on universal access.
The WHO revised their treatment guidelines for when HIV-positive people should start ART, raising the CD4 count recommendation from 200 to 350. (CD4 cells, or T-cells, are part of the immune system attacked by HIV; a higher CD4 count means more virus-fighting cells, and a healthier person.)
"WHO's new recommendations are excellent in theory, but they did not give us a practical way of implementing the guidelines--already we have shortages of drugs in trying to put people with CD4s below 200 on treatment," said James Kamau, coordinator of the Kenya Treatment Access Movement. Read more about how funding shortfalls foil meeting new treatment guidelines here.
Without an increase in funding it will be impossible to meet the promise of universal access for all and provide equitable treatment and care.
Said Robin Gorna, executive director of the International AIDS Society, "Instead of building on progress, some donor nations and governments of highly affected countries are backing away from the universal access commitment with a series of poorly funded half-measures on AIDS. The situation is now an emergency: new treatment enrolments in many countries are coming to a standstill, the risk of drug resistance is increasing, and fragile gains made over the last 10 years may soon erode, with potentially serious consequences for future efforts to control this epidemic."
These news stories are just two of many voices calling for industrialized nations to meet their commitments to continue progress on HIV and other global health challenges. Despite the recession, governments should find a way to keep these promises and not leave ministries of health in the position of having to turn HIV-positive people away from the possibility of a healthy life.
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