ACW: AIDS Commitments

Brazil's Aids policy 'remarkable'

2007-11-14T14:21:00.000+07:00

By, Gary Duffy, BBC News, November 14, 2007

Bargaining with pharmaceutical firms to bring down the price of Aids drugs and producing cheap generic versions has saved Brazil $1bn, a study has shown.
Infection rates in the Latin American country have been kept at a similar level to the US, the report finds.

And more than 180,000 Brazilians have access to Aids treatment.

Brazil's achievement is described as "remarkable", in the study published by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health in the United States.

Brazil's policy for dealing with HIV and Aids has long been widely admired for its commitment to effective treatment combined with an aggressive promotion of the safe sex message.

In 1996 it became the first developing country to commit to providing free and universal access to Aids drugs.

Broken patent

Now a study published in the Public Library of Science journal by researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health suggests the policy has saved Brazil around $1bn between 2001 and 2005.

By threatening to produce cheaper generic versions of existing drugs, the government has repeatedly persuaded companies to reduce their prices.

Earlier this year Brazil broke the patent on the Aids drug Efavirenz and decided to import a cheaper version from India.

Drugs companies have warned that action like this would only discourage them from carrying out the expensive research needed to improve the drugs required to treat HIV.

Brazil says the decision was taken in the public interest, which is why it also produces generic versions of eight drugs that do not have patents.

To some extent the policy has been a victim of its own success, with the new research suggesting drug costs rose rapidly as treatment was provided to more people who were also living longer.

Researchers also say other developing countries are now proving more successful in producing cheaper generic Aids drugs and Brazil, which once led the way with this approach, needs to be more aggressive.

Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7093809.stm

Good news for persons with HIV/AIDS: Global Fund to continue providing antiretroviral medication

2007-11-09T10:36:00.000+07:00

By, The Jamaica Observer, October 27, 2007

The Global Fund has committed to continue providing antiretroviral medication for another six years for Persons living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV), according to the Ministry of Health.

A number of PLHIVs in Jamaica and other developing countries had expressed concerns about their ability to access the drug at the end of Global Fund's five-year funding, which see them receiving the medication at a minimal cost or free of cost.

Prior to Jamaica receiving US$23 million from the Global Fund in 2003, persons with HIV/AIDS had to pay up to $30,000 for a month's supply of the drug. Today these persons are only required to pay $1,000 for the drug, but can receive it free of cost if they are unable to pay.

"The Global Fund, in committing to be around to support PLHIV, has developed a new approach for funding whereby if you perform well and maintain an 'A' rating throughout the grant you will automatically be offered a six-year extension and we have," said Dr Kevin Harvey, co-ordinator of treatment care and support at the Ministry of Health.

However, Dr Harvey said they have made allocation in the next proposal, for the drug to be provided free of cost to all.
Harvey was addressing PLHIVs and major stakeholders at the Jamaica AIDS Support for Life (JASL) and the Latin America and the Caribbean Council of AIDS Service Organisation (LACASSO) breakfast meeting at Eden Garden Restaurant in Kingston.

Dr Harvey said the ministry was, in the meantime, awaiting the approval of its latest proposal to Global Fund where some US$44 million was requested to continue the fight against the deadly disease.

Of the 175 proposals received worldwide for Global Fund support, 72 have been recommended for funding. However, Jamaica will have to wait until November when the board and the technical review panel meet to know if they are approved.
"I would be very disappointed and surprised if we were not one of the persons selected," said Dr Harvey.

Under the last proposal which lasted five years, Jamaica was awarded US$23 million which assisted in providing medication for 3,500 of the 5,000 persons who needed it.
Today, he said, it is estimated that between 7,000 to 8,000 persons need to be put on ARV medication.

"The task, however, is to provide universal access to treatment care and support and that is why we need to get the proposal for US$44 million approved so we can scale up and try and provide medication to at least 80-90 per cent of who need to be on it," he said.

Dr Harvey said, too, that providing persons with ARV was very critical as it was assisting PLHIVs to live longer, more meaningful lives .
"We have seen in children over a 40 per cent decrease in death rates from AIDS and a 36 per cent reduction in adults," he said.

Source: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/html/20071026T210000-0500_128737_OBS_GOOD_NEWS_FOR_PERSONS_WITH_HIV_AIDS_.asp

Central America suffers highest HIV, AIDS rates in Latin America

2007-11-08T16:59:00.000+07:00

By, www.chinaview.cn, November 5, 2007

Central America is suffering the highest HIV and AIDS rates in Latin America, the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) said Monday in a statement.

In Central America, there are 1.7 million people with HIV, of whom 208,600 have AIDS, UNAIDS said. The figure includes Belize and Panama, which are frequently excluded from the region's statistical base.

"In 2010 the Central American epidemic could reach an infection rate of two percent in the adult population," the organization said.

UNAIDS is taking part in the fifth Central American People With HIV/AIDS Encounter, which began in the Nicaraguan capital Managua on Sunday. The conference's motto is "Our response: seeking equality, diversity and fighting discrimination faced with HIV and AIDS."

The meeting, aimed to help people with HIV or AIDS to exchange their experiences, will focus on women and children with HIV/AIDS in the region.

Nicaragua is also hosting the fifth Central American Congress on HIV, which is a part of the meeting.

The congress is a policy-oriented event designed to influence the region's politicians and achieve universal access to prevention, support and treatment of HIV/AIDS.

Source: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-11/06/content_7018380.htm

Missing the target: Failing to provide universal access

2007-11-06T16:00:00.000+07:00

By, Masimba Biriwasha, Zimbabwe, HDN Key Correspondent Team, August 2, 2007

The goal of universal access to HIV treatment by 2010 is in danger of being missed, according to a report issued by the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition (ITPC), a coalition of HIV activists from more than 125 countries.

The report, titled 'Missing the target', said that plans to rapidly expand access to treatment to 10 million people by 2010 would not be successful unless efforts were drastically increased.

Despite evidence to show that HIV treatments prolong life, many people around the world continue to die of the disease. In 2006 alone, three million people succumbed to AIDS. Many of these lives could have been saved by greater access to treatment and health-care services.

Although some progress has been made towards improving access to treatment, many people continue to be denied access to essential, life-saving drugs. In developing countries, just 28% of the 7.1 million people who need HIV treatment are receiving it.

According to ITPC, which has conducted an analysis of HIV treatment in 17 countries, only 700,000 more people received treatment in 2006 than in the previous year. The group said that if the rates of treatment expansion were not tripled, the goal of universal access by 2010 would not be realised.

"The slow progress has already cost thousands of lives, and is destined to cost millions more. This is particularly tragic because evidence shows that AIDS treatment delivery is working," the ITPC report said.

Poverty remains a key factor impeding access to antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). Many people who do have access to the treatment do not have the money to feed themselves or access other vital health care services.

What is often called 'free treatment' remains out of reach for the vast majority of people in need, with transport and diagnostic testing costs often proving prohibitive, the report said.

"While timely and expanded distribution of ARVs remains the core objective, much greater attention is now needed on emerging challenges such as reaching marginalized groups, children, and people in rural areas, and providing vital support services such as transportation and nutritional assistance," ITPC's report said.

The collapse of health systems in many of the countries with high HIV prevalence rates is also a significant contributing factor to the failure to reach many people affected. Even where the drugs are available, if there are no health care workers to administer them, access to treatment will not improve.

The worsening shortage of doctors, nurses, and community health workers who can provide HIV care needs to be tackled with increased financial investments and policy reforms, according to ITPC.

"Developing country governments must take on greater leadership on HIV/AIDS. People living with HIV and civil society must engage with their governments and insist they do more. In advocating for change, [people living with HIV] and civil society often face serious challenges and risk," said the report.

It also accused donors of failing to establish a successful formula for securing the regular and reliable funding essential to universal access efforts. ITPC said that funding agencies needed to make more visible efforts towards increasing access to treatment among poorer communities and integrating tuberculosis (TB) and other treatments into health services.

"UNAIDS and WHO provide important assistance on global treatment scale up through policy development and, in some cases, through efforts that facilitate the inclusion of civil society," the report said.

"But these agencies must be more outspoken when national programmes are mismanaged, targets are not met, or vulnerable populations are neglected; it is part of UN's moral responsibility to speak out when countries fail their people."

HDN 2007

Source: http://www.thecorrespondent.org/featuredarticle.view.aspx?a=1caae13b-8b09-49b4-8685-3417dcc1e61a

AIDS: Winning the Fight, Losing the War

2007-11-06T15:52:00.000+07:00

By, Chinua Akukwe, Worldpress.org, October 22, 2007

The fight against H.I.V./AIDS is throwing up an unlikely scenario whereby steady progress made in the fight against the epidemic may not translate into significant gains in the long-term war against the global epidemic. How is it possible to be on a winning streak in the fight against H.I.V./AIDS in the short term and yet be in danger of losing the long-term battle to contain the epidemic?

It is important to begin with a summary of the known impact of H.I.V./AIDS in the last 25 years. According to the United Nations agency coordinating response to the epidemic, UNAIDS, 65 million individuals have contracted H.I.V. since 1981. At least 39.5 million people live with H.I.V. In the last 25 years, 25 million people have died of AIDS. In 2006 alone, 4.3 million individuals contracted H.I.V. and 2.9 million died of AIDS. Countries with a huge AIDS burden face contracting economies and work force shortages.

Winning the Fight and Losing the War Against H.I.V./AIDS
I briefly discuss how we are winning the fight and yet are in danger of losing the long-term battle against H.I.V./AIDS.

The international resolve to fight AIDS reached unprecedented momentum in 2001 when the United Nations General Assembly, in a special session, adopted the Declaration of Commitment on H.I.V./AIDS and Millennium Development Goals, explicitly recognizing the need for a strong political will in the fight against the epidemic. The declaration also highlighted the need for coordinated resource mobilization in fighting and reversing the impact of the epidemic by 2015. The General Assembly reaffirmed its commitment to the fight against AIDS with the 2006 Political Declaration on H.I.V./AIDS, urging universal access to H.I.V. prevention, treatment, care, and support by 2010. The 2006 declaration emphasized the role of stable and adequate long-term financing strategies. The creation of the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria to finance remedial efforts is a testament to the global resolve on AIDS. The United States government program against AIDS (PEPFAR) committed $15 billion over five years, making it the largest bilateral program of its kind. The European Union and the Gates Foundation also significantly increased their support of global AIDS efforts. The United Nations reports that at the end of 2006, 90 countries had set national H.I.V./AIDS remedial targets and 25 countries had developed costed, priority national plans.

An unequivocal evidence of the steady progress in the fight against H.I.V./AIDS is the level of financial support available worldwide. The UNAIDS indicates that funding for global H.I.V./AIDS rose from $300 million in 1996 to $8.9 billion in 2006. Funding for H.I.V./AIDS programs worldwide is expected to reach $10 billion in 2007.

However, in long-term war plans, the dramatic increase in financial support is less than half of what is needed to fight the epidemic. At least $18 billion is needed in 2007 and another $22 billion in 2008. The UNAIDS estimates that to achieve universal access to H.I.V./AIDS services by 2010, $32 billion to $51 billion will be needed. Today, there is no credible evidence that needed financial resources will be available by 2010.

Steady progress is also evident in access to lifesaving antiretroviral therapy. In 2004, about 300,000 individuals were on antiretroviral therapy worldwide. By the end of 2006, 2.2 million individuals were receiving antiretroviral medication. The increased access to treatment is remarkable. However, the impressive numbers of individuals on treatment belie five ominous concerns, with grave implications in the long-term battle against AIDS.

First, individuals currently receiving treatment represent less than 30 percent of the 7.1 million people clinically qualified to receive antiretroviral medications. These individuals will likely die without treatment. Second, the scale-up of antiretroviral therapy is not keeping pace with clinical need, leading to an increase in the number of AIDS deaths. In 2006, 2.9 million people died of AIDS compared to 2.2 million in 2006. Third, for every one person on antiretroviral therapy, six new people contract H.I.V., signaling a losing battle in the long term. Fourth, only 10 percent of pregnant women with AIDS receive treatment to prevent H.I.V. transmission to their newborns. Every year up to 500,000 pregnant mothers transmit H.I.V. to their newborns. Fifth, a recent study indicates that more than one-third of individuals on antiretroviral therapy in Africa die or discontinue treatment within two years. These individuals die or discontinue treatment for a number of reasons, including commencing treatment very late in their illness, and dying shortly thereafter; inability to travel long distances to receive medications in health facilities; inability to pay for treatment; and the difficulties of juxtaposing struggle for daily survival with the logistics of keeping up with treatment schedules and protocols.

The prevention of new H.I.V. infections has received considerable planning and implementation attention in the fight against the epidemic. Innovative information, education, and communication campaigns have been introduced, focusing on the needs and priorities of target populations. Scientists are working in an unprecedented collaborative effort to produce H.I.V. vaccines. A very promising weapon in the battle to prevent new H.I.V. infection is the preliminary result that male circumcision can reduce new heterosexual infections by up to 60 percent. A recent study in South Africa suggests that exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of life can reduce the risk of pregnant women transmitting H.I.V. to their babies.

However, the battle to prevent new H.I.V. transmission faces long odds. A credible, clinically effective, and deployable H.I.V. vaccine is 7 years to 10 years away, removing the scenario of a potential quick fix. As earlier noted, six new infections occur for every one person on antiretroviral therapy. More than 90 percent of individuals living with H.I.V. are unaware of their status and may unwittingly continue to transmit the virus. The UNAIDS estimates that only 15 percent of individuals at risk of H.I.V. transmission in some countries are benefiting from appropriate preventive strategies. H.I.V. prevention programs also suffer from inadequate funding. In addition, preventive programs are spread thinly among at-risk groups, with insufficient program attention directed toward behavior modification among target populations.

Although H.I.V./AIDS has multisectoral consequences, most current programs lack linkages to other health and social risk factors that can facilitate H.I.V. transmission. Today, H.I.V./AIDS programs are not adequately addressing the needs of AIDS orphans and street children. Ongoing AIDS programs are rarely integrated with initiatives that prevent childhood and maternal deaths. In most AIDS hard hit countries, programs are not tightly coordinated with national initiatives on poverty alleviation, education, gender equality, and human rights. Fragmented and dysfunctional health systems in countries with a heavy AIDS burden remain long-term concerns. Lack of a qualified health workforce is another long-term threat.

Perhaps, the most fundamental threat in the long-term battle against H.I.V./AIDS is the current lackluster community-based response to the global epidemic. As the emergency response phase of the global epidemic slowly gives way to the phase of leveraging resources, mobilizing target populations, and sustaining successful programs, the long-term battle against the epidemic will be fought at community levels where individuals infected and affected by H.I.V./AIDS live and die. A strong community-based response to H.I.V./AIDS should include sustained information, education, and communication campaigns directed at specific target populations or cohorts; timely access to quality clinical care and support programs; and the availability of comprehensive social services.

Conclusion
The H.I.V./AIDS epidemic continues to challenge the collective will of the international community. The last six years has witnessed unprecedented short-term wins in the fight against the epidemic. Financial, technical, and logistics resources have increased significantly. However, we are in the danger of losing the long-term battle to prevent new H.I.V. infection, to provide timely antiretroviral therapy and support care, and to deal with health and nonhealth facilitative factors that help sustain the epidemic. We are also yet to begin the long battle against H.I.V./AIDS in the communities where the global epidemic is wrecking its most havoc.

Source: http://www.worldpress.org/Americas/2970.cfm

Country Doing Well in Universal Access

2007-11-06T14:12:00.000+07:00

By, Trading Markets.com, October 9, 2007

Panos Southern African HIV/AIDS regional programme manager, Lilian Chigona, recently came to Botswana to brief the media about Universal Access.

Chigona briefed the media about Universal Access, which "is the right and ability to receive comprehensive, uniform and an affordable set of confidential and appropriate health services. The three aspects of the programme are prevention, treatment, care and support."

Present at the workshop were representatives of different organisations amongst them, National AIDS Coordinating Agency (NACA), the National ARV Therapy Programme, called MASA and Botswana Network on Ethics, Law and HIV/AIDS BONELA, who were afforded the opportunity to brief the media on the progress of Botswana on the Universal Access issue.

The meeting heard that the Botswana tended to concentrate on treatment while prevention and the care and support aspects were overlooked.

To emphasize the importance of other aspects when comes to dealing with HIV/AIDS, Chigona gave an example of Angola and Zambia.

She said that Angola had the lowest prevalence HIV rate.

"With the low prevalence in Angola the country could invest less on treatment and focus more on prevention to combat incident rates. On the other hand, Zambia needed to invest more on both treatment and prevention to combat both the high incidence and prevalence rates.

Botswana' prevention efforts seem to be lagging behind, but with the on-going research on the Truvada Pill (a combination of two ARV drugs that researchers think might prevent HIV) the country is coming to the party.

Chigona went on to point out that although the treatment issue was being addressed there are still people not adhering to the medication because of religious beliefs while others think that they have been cured once the ARV starts working on them.

"There are some people who tend to think that they have been cured once the HIV related symptoms disappear after they have taken the drugs for some time, while others are told by their pastors that they have been cured when that is not the truth."

These people usually return to hospitals when too ill and are put on the second line of treatment.

"But once you start resisting the second it's over for you. In Zambia, there are only two lines of treatment," said Chigona.

The meeting heard that Botswana is one of the few lucky African countries which provide the third line of treatment, as most countries only give the first and second line of treatment. But once one is resistant to the third line of treatment, "it's over".

Chigona appealed to the media to avoid "AIDS Fatigue" as the battle is still far from over. She also asked the journalists to always make sure to communicate the correct health information.

Joshua Machao, ARV' Coordinator at Masa Antiretroviral Therapy, said that in June 2006 at the Botswana United General Assembly High Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS, they had agreed to work towards the goal of "Universal Access to comprehensive prevention programmes, treatment, care and support by 2010."

In terms of accessing treatment Botswana accounts for Over 90, 478 people on ART.

"By July 2007 Botswana was providing 6,882, about 9% of children with HIV treatment. In a survey that was conducted in 2004 it was also discovered that stigmatization attitudes are lowering in Botswana and this was due to the fact that treatment access helps to reduce HIV stigma."

Oratile Moseki of BONELA revealed that people most at risk of contacting HIV are Sex Workers, men having sex with other men, children born from HIV positive mothers, prisoners, partners of persons living with HIV and gay men.

Despite being hailed a success story in other areas, Moseki observed that Botswana was behind in her response to the most 'at-risk' groups and it has been proven by the National Spending Assessment commissioned by NACA that there is zero spending on these groups.

"The national response to date is the prevention of mother to child programme (PMTCT), routine HIV testing, TB monitoring & control, home based care programmes, ARV Programmes and the multi-sectoral approach policed by National AIDS Council & facilitated by National AIDS Coordinating Agency (NACA)," she said.

Panos works with the media and other communicators to foster debate on under-reported, misrepresented or misunderstood development issues.

Their headquarters are in London with branches in Paris, the Caribbean, South Asia, East Africa, West Africa, Southern Africa and Canada; Panos Southern Africa is based in Lusaka, Zambia with HIV/AIDS issues at the forefront of all agendas in all the Panos branches.

Source: http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/683578/

Zimbabwe’s HIV infection rate continues to fall

2007-11-06T13:16:00.000+07:00

By, Webwire, November 2, 2007

New data shows that Zimbabwe’s HIV rate continues to drop, giving it one of the most significant and rapid declines of any country in the world.

The overall HIV prevalence among antenatal clinic attendees (pregnant women) decreased from 25.7per cent in 2002 to 21.3per cent (2004) and now to 17.7per cent in 2006. Based on this, Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Health and Child Welfare and international experts today published the new estimate of the HIV sero-prevalence rate among Zimbabwe’s adult population to be 15.6per cent.

The new data reinforces Zimbabwe’s successes in behaviour change among young people. The biggest falls among pregnant women were recorded among the 15-24 year age group, showing a drop in HIV from 20.8 percent to 13.1 percent in just four years (2002 to 2006).

“Young people are having fewer partners and using more condoms,” said UNFPA’s Representative in Zimbabwe, Bruce Campbell. “They have heard the messages, taken action, and are being safer. Now we must continue our combined efforts to ensure national HIV prevention programmes have an even greater reach.”

Zimbabwe was one of the first countries to develop a comprehensive epidemiological review which resulted in an evidence-based behaviour change strategy. Promotion of partner reduction and consistent condom use remain at the core of the strategy.

Under the leadership of the National AIDS Council, and with critical financial donor support, UNICEF and UNFPA have enlarged their behaviour change programmes for young people both within and out of the school context. With additional funding they will continue to broaden these programmes, in particular around girl empowerment, teacher training, youth education through sports, and training more peer educators.

The United Nations in Zimbabwe said that today’s announcement underscores the need to strive for continued broad behaviour change promotion and universal access to quality HIV prevention, as well as adolescent sexual and reproductive health services. Without ongoing and substantial support, the current positive national trends will not be sustainable.

Strong government commitment that has led to early investment in education and health sectors, the establishment of an AIDS Trust Fund, and the early creation of a National AIDS Control Programme (now the National AIDS Council), have all been immensely influential in the drop.

“It is imperative that all partners adhere closely to the concept of ‘three Ones’,” said Country Director of UNAIDS, Dr Kwame Ampomah. “One of our greatest achievements over the last few years has been a truly collaborative and concerted effort to ensure that all partners support the National AIDS Strategic Plan (ZNASP), and that there is only one national coordination mechanism led by the National AIDS Council, and only one comprehensive and integrated Monitoring and Evaluation System.”

Said UNICEF’s Representative in Zimbabwe, Dr Festo Kavishe: “Zimbabweans have again shown that they have the determination and the education to defeat HIV/AIDS, and a variety of causes of child mortality. However, mortality also played a hand in the drop and there remains an urgent need to boost prevention and treatment programmes in Zimbabwe.”

Currently around two-thirds of people who need treatment are not receiving it, and so without a significant additional injection of funds, universal access will not be attained. Moreover, while there has been an increase in geographical expansion of prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT) services in Zimbabwe, much more needs to be done for successful scaling-up of programmes. There are an estimated 98,000 HIV positive pregnant women in need of PMTCT services, far more that the 8500 who received them in 2006.

“There is no doubt that a drop in the rate is great news,” said WHO Representative in Zimbabwe, Dr Mandlhate. “However let us recognize that a sero-prevalence rate of 15.6per cent remains high and this is not the moment for relaxing. Rather we must take advantage of this positive action by youth and put even greater energy and resources. The United Nations family reiterates its commitment to supporting Government efforts towards the achievement of universal access of HIV prevention, treatment care and protection for those living with HIV and their families.”

Source: http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=51842

U.N., Google, Cisco Systems Launch Web Site Aimed at Providing Data on Millennium Development Goals

2007-11-06T11:30:00.000+07:00

By, Kaisernetwork, November 5, 2007

The United Nations, Google and Cisco Systems on Thursday launched a Web site aimed at providing data and information on global efforts to meet the U.N. Millennium Development Goals, the AP/International Herald Tribune reports.

The Web site, called MDG Monitor, will provide updated information on efforts to fight malnutrition, poverty and diseases, such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. In addition, site users can use Google Earth's map and satellite images to explore places where programs aimed at meeting the MDGs have been implemented, Michael Jones, chief technologist for Google Earth and Maps, said. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon added that the site will provide information for policymakers and development experts to learn from successes and setbacks in other countries and will increase public awareness about efforts to achieve the goals.

Ban said the new Web site is "crucial" because it will provide information about the MDGs in one place "for all who seek it with a few simple clicks of the mouse." He added that "achieving the MDGs is a matter of political will" and that the "resources, knowledge and tools for achieving the goals do exist."

The project -- which received $150,000 from corporate donors -- has a total budget of $200,000, according to the U.N. Development Program, which is facilitating the site. Data on the site are compiled from U.N. agencies, the World Bank and governments, Kemal Dervis, UNDP administrator, said. Dervis added that data can be hard to obtain and can differ among sources. The United Nations "hope[s] to gradually ... open the site to all organizations who gather statistics to offer their information," Dervis said (AP/International Herald Tribune, 11/2).

Malaysia Expected To Achieve Millennium Development Goals On HIV/AIDS

2007-10-02T11:05:00.000+07:00

By, Malaysian National News Agency, October 1, 2007

Malaysia is expected to achieve the Millennium Development Goals on HIV/Aids after the government's programmes to reduce the spread of the disease have begun to yield positive results, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said Monday.

The deputy prime minister said that the long-term effects of the methadone replacement therapy, exchange of syringes and anti-rectroviral treatment programmes were expected be seen by 2010.

"If this is achieved, Malaysia is expected to achieve the Millennium Development Goals in three target areas, namely reducing child and maternal mortality and the spread of HIV," he told reporters after chairing a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Aids here.

He said the methadone replacement therapy programme would be extended to 25,000 HIV sufferers by 2010, from 5,000 people under the programme this year.

The programme had enabled 66 per cent of HIV carries to hold down permanent jobs and 24 per cent to do general work after 12 months of treatment, he said.

A total of 76,389 HIV/Aids were detected in the country last year.

Of the 5,800 new cases detected last year, 32 per cent contracted the disease through sex.

HIV screening last detected 15.6 per cent of the HIV carriers in the drug rehabilitation centres, 5.3 per cent in prisons and 8.9 per cent in tuberculosis (TB) centres while 0.13 per cent were detected through pre-nuptial tests and 0.03 per cent involved pregnant mothers, he said.

Source: http://www.bernama.com.my/bernama/v3/news.php?id=287856

Would This Aid Get to African Children?

2007-06-12T09:50:00.000+07:00

By, Roland Ogbonnaya, This Day, June 11, 2007

At the final day of the G8 Summit that hold in Kuehlungsborn, Germany, the western leaders agreed on aid programme worth $60 billion to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases that have been decimating the African population, especially children and women.

James Nkemakolam is chairperson of a youth club on HIV/Aids in Abia State, Nigeria. He is a volunteer trainer in carpentry. A form two drop out almost three years ago, he intends to sit for Junior Certificate examinations. Nkemakolam also thinks he is now in a better position to define what good things lie ahead for him. Thanks to a local community based organisation (CBO).

“This group lifted me out of despair. I don’t have parents. I used to see life through shattered spectacles,” said the young boy. “But for three years now, I have seen my life reshaping and becoming more meaningful. Now I know I can do something with myself, do something for my relations and my friends.”

Some of Nkemakolam’s friends gather at the centre everyday. There they are shaped and sharpened into carpenters, tailors and tinsmiths. They also accompany Nkemakolam on an arduous errand of criss-crossing 12 villages with loads of life-changing information.

Nkemakolam would not have conquered poverty if not for the support the local CBO provided. There are many Nkemakolams in Nigeria and other countries in sub Saharan Africa who have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS and other related diseases.

In a number of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, widespread HIV infection has already translated into full-blown AIDS epidemics. There have been studies, which are important steps toward understanding the complex threats to society that HIV/AIDS poses.

Some key conclusions of the studies are that HIV and AIDS and poverty are mutually reinforcing, has severe impact on agriculture and food security, is very much a gender issue, while there is the need to invest in children. The key message concerning prevention is that the empowerment of women in all spheres of economic and social life is of paramount importance for sustained progress in the fight against the spread of the epidemic.

The leaders of Group of Eight (G8) Summit holding in Germany share the travails of HIV/AIDS patients in Africa. Members of the group at the weekend agreed on a program worth more than $60-billion (U.S.) to combat the spread of HIV/AIDs in Africa. Germany's Development Minister, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul made the announcement on state ZDF television before G8 leaders sat down with African and international officials to discuss African issues on Friday.

Ms. Wieczorek-Zeul said the money was earmarked for fighting malaria and tuberculosis, as well as HIV/AIDS and about half of it would come from the United States, with Germany contributing $5.4-billion between now and 2015. “The situation in Africa is simply so dramatic,” she said in Berlin.

Proponents of debt relief in Africa and other social activists have criticised the world's leading industrial nations for failing to live up to promises made two years ago at the G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland.

Last Thursday, musician and social activist Bono told a crowd attending a protest concert in nearby Rostock that he had a “very tough meeting” with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and was convinced, at one point, he might have to throw in the towel.

Music producer Bob Geldof said the U2 singer — with whom he has turned aid to Africa a global campaign — became depressed during their meeting with Ms. Merkel. Mr. Geldof said the German Chancellor was talking about sending only $940-million to Africa, instead of the $2-billion they believe is needed.

But Mr. Geldof said he was hopeful that Ms. Merkel, who on Thursday announced an agreement among the G8 on climate change, could persuade leaders to act on Africa. The 2005 G8 summit called for increasing the amount of aid to $50-billion a year through 2010, with half of that going to Africa itself.

However, since then, the pledge has fallen short, with the amount pledged set to miss its target by $30-billion, anti-poverty and aid groups said. They singled out Canada and Italy for scorn for what one official said was an attempt to keep a renewed call for African aid off the G8 communiqu้ this year.

Africa was on the agenda of Friday's meetings in the resort of Heiligendamm of G8 heads of state and international officials, while activists said they would be looking for a renewed commitment to the continent.

Prime Minister Romano Prodi of Italy said his country, which owes $351.34-million and did not pay in 2006 and 2007, has pledged to pay that amount and would increase aid spending to $540.52-million next year. Japan has also signalled that it would not block any language in the final communiqu้ on targets to increase aid, combat AIDS and provide for more education in Africa. Rather, it said it would also continue to focus on Africa when it takes over the G8 presidency next year.

Interestingly, the final day of the Heiligendamm summit saw an agreement on delivering $60bn of additional aid over the coming years. It is expected that the extra cash will be used to meet the commitment made at Gleneagles to provide universal access to anti-retroviral HIV treatments by 2010.

The outgoing British Prime Minister, Tony Blair said that "immense progress" had been made on support for Africa. There was also a pledge to spend an additional $500m this year on supporting education in Africa, with more support to follow over the longer term. A further agreement saw the leaders pledge action on reducing malaria deaths by half with programmes in 30 African countries.

In a bid to deal with problems such as the crisis in Darfur, there was also agreement in principle to help fund an African Union peacekeeping force. Blair, attending his final G8 leaders meeting, hailed the agreement reached on Africa as a 'partnership' between that continent and the developed world.

Speaking after the release of the final communique on Africa, which made pledges on aid and trade, Blair said 'immense progress' had been made towards securing better trade access for poorer nations. This included 'support for Africa's ability to trade its goods', he said.

'We have...recommitted ourselves to all of the commitments we made a couple of years ago at Gleneagles. But the important thing is that we have now set out how we are going to do them. Because this is a partnership, it is a deal between Africa and the developed world and just as we have recommitted ourselves to substantial increases in support and help, so Africa has recommitted itself to its responsibilities as part of the partnership,” Blair said. He added that both sides were aware 'that we have a long way to go and a lot to do'.

'But the truth is there has been immense progress made and probably one really important indication is that Japan has said that for next year's G8 Africa is going to be right at the centre of the agenda and that has got to be good news,' he said.
As the world leaders rose from the meeting at the weekend they discussed about reducing the increasing rate of HIV/AIDS alongside the core focal points of global responsibility and climate protection issues.

However, there was pessimism as far as the African agenda was concerned. The reason is because the western nations have consistently failed to deliver on their promises to the developing nations. A typical example is the Gleneagles accord of 2005, which was the climax of the ‘make poverty history’ campaign designed to put pressure on the G8 to provide help for Africa by opening up export markets, providing debt relief and increasing aid budgets.

The commitment then was to double global aid by 2010, with half of that $50 billion increase earmarked for sub-Saharan Africa. But, figures just released by Data, an aid-monitoring organisation, showed that G8 assistance to sub-Saharan Africa has increased by only $2.3bn since 2004. To be on track for the 2010 target it should have increased by at least $5.4bn.

G8 national budgets indicate that only small increases in aid are in the pipeline for this year and next. Basically, there are no concrete long-term commitments to ensure that the international targets to even halve poverty by 2015 are met.

The annual G8 summits are extremely high profile and centres for extensive lobbying by advocacy groups because the eight countries making up the G8 represent about 14 per cent of the world population, but they account for nearly two thirds of the world’s economic output measured by gross domestic product.

As the violent riots which ushered in the summit showed to express, G8 members were for very good historical, current and growing reasons seen to be heavily responsible for global issues such as poverty in Africa and developing countries due to debt crisis and unfair trading policy, global warming due to carbon dioxide emission, the AIDS problem due to strict medicine patent policy and other problems that are related to the otherwise positive phenomenon of globalisation.

Certainly, there has been a modest increase in aid spending over the past two years. Yet, it has been woefully short of the very commitments contained in the communiqu้ signed by G8 leaders at Gleneagles, Scotland, in 2005. But, this is not stopping African leaders from returning there to press further the continent’s case.

The African Union Chairman, President John Agyekum Kufuor of Ghana lead a delegation of African heads of states invited to make what some critics called a "token appearance" at the summit. Other African leaders at the summit include South Africa's Thabo Mbeki, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, Abdelaziz Bouteflika of Algeria, and Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal. Also at the event is Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua, making his first trip abroad after his May 29 swearing-in.

At the just-ended Africa Business Forum before the G8 summit, it was concluded that strategies for reducing poverty in Africa would fail unless there is a concerted effort to facilitate private enterprise and trade. Participants to the forum, who included Presidents Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia and Ugandan Yoweri Museveni and other top-level representatives, said in a statement that actions to promote better investment, enterprise and employment should sit at the heart of any long-term strategy for a prosperous Africa.

Chairman of the Business Action Forum, Edward Bickham, said the forum, held on the eve of the G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, had taken note that the G8 leaders must use their influence to build Africa's capacity to trade.

He added that the forum welcomed the fact that climate change had been put high on the G8 summit agenda due to the fragility of Africa's agriculture and environment as climate change carried many risks for Africa, including desertification, water shortages and increase in malaria cases.

Bickham also said the top-level participants were unanimous that funding was required for adaptation for technology transfer and to enable Africa to take maximum advantage of the opportunities created by carbon trading and development mechanism projects under the Kyoto Protocol.

Many development experts have said that Africa needs the new aid package to tackle diseases, poverty and increased trade. But Asha-Rose Migiro said despite faster growth and strengthened institutions, Africa remains off-track to meeting the world's shared goals for fighting poverty in all its forms, hence the need for international support for the continent.

Presenting an update on sub-Saharan Africa's progress towards obtaining the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) - a set of global anti-poverty and development targets to be achieved by 2015, Ms. Migiro said the summit of G8 industrialised nations provides an opportunity for donor countries to lay out concrete timetables for how they will increase development assistance to African countries.

Among the challenges, she cited "shockingly high" maternal mortality rates, and the fact that the number of new HIV/AIDS cases is still rising faster than the rate at which new treatment is being offered. All of the challenges, she said, can be addressed using resources, skills and technologies that the international community has at its disposal, based on the commitments made by African Governments and the donor community alike.

There is pressure on the African leaders to show commitment in eliminating diseases and improving indices for the achievement of the MDGs. Parliamentarians from African, Asia, European and G-8 countries in Berlin on May 30 and 31, for the “G8 Parliamentarians Conference on the Economic Rewards of Investing in HIV/AIDS Prevention and Health” committed themselves to provide the political leadership on a national, European and international level to fight the pandemic and improve the wellbeing of the millions of people.

“We recall the international commitment to achieve universal access to reproductive heath by 2015 as set out in the Programme of Action from the International conference on Population and Development and as a target under Millennium Development Goal.We recognise that Africa’s development cannot be achieved without taking into account that the current increase of the HIV-infections lowers a country’s economic growth rates.

“We further recognised that sexual and reproductive health problems account for one third of the total health burden among women and are a leading driver of poverty. The HIV/AIDS pandemic is increasingly amongst the young and female, while poverty, malnutrition, malaria, TB and other infectious diseases, lack of clean water and sanitation are additional burdens to the HIV infection,” the parliamentarians said.
They warned that focusing on only one of these threats would not be sufficient as the future of a country lies in its people, particularly women and young people.

There will be “no future when they become victims of HIV/AIDS or poverty. Caring for those infected and affected by AIDS – including orphans - is a heavy burden, which continues to fall mainly to women. Older women, women heading households and grandmothers in particular deserve respect and need support.”

Source: http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=80581

Africa: G8 - Much Talk, Too Few Results

2007-06-11T12:13:00.000+07:00

By, Julio Godoy, Inter Press Service (Johannesburg), June 9, 2007

This year's summit of the G8 heads of government will likely be remembered as a "how not to" organise such an event, for the contrast between the expectations it raised and its negligible accomplishments, and for its enormous security costs.

The three-day Group of Eight summit, held in this Baltic seaside resort, ended with two vague, non-binding promises -- more aid for Africa, and negotiations towards a post-Kyoto Protocol international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions -- and failures in numerous other items on the agenda.

This G8 failure in Heiligendamm to pass its self-imposed test of credibility will certainly mark the future of its summits.

The leaders of the G8 countries (Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, and the United States) said their farewells without an agreement on international trade negotiations, or on eliminating subsidies for agriculture in the industrialised world, a move that would give development a boost in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

No agreement was reached either on a new regulation of the highly speculative, and therefore risky, hedge funds, nor on the political status of the Serbian province of Kosovo.

At the same time, the only accords the G8 leaders reached in Heiligendamm -- on a medium-term reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and new aid for Africa -- are considered as weak compromises, tailored only to avoid the impression that the summit was a total failure.

On Friday, the G8 leaders agreed to allocate 60 billion U.S. dollars "over the coming years" to finance the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, and a further 500 million dollars for the "Education for All" programme in Africa.

But development and aid experts consider this new pledge as a step backwards, compared to the promises made by the G8 at the 2005 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, to double development assistance by 2010. The Gleneagles deal would mean an annual increase of aid levels by 50 billion dollars starting in 2006.

"The whole declaration (on aid for Africa) is just cosmetic", Ulrich Post, development expert at the German non-governmental organisation Welthungerhilfe (World Hunger Aid), one of the country's largest aid campaigners.

Post regretted that the G8 declaration on Africa "only mentions agriculture (in Africa) with one single phrase. In the face of more than 200 million people suffering from chronic malnutrition, of which 80 percent live on rural areas, this behaviour is scandalous," Post added.

According to the development watchdog Oxfam, the new G8 aid promise for Africa means at best "just three billion U.S. dollars extra in aid by 2010."

Previous to the Heiligendamm summit, Oxfam had shown that the G8 countries would miss their 2010 target on aid for Africa by 30 billion dollars. "Today's announcement may only close that gap to 27 billion dollars," the organisation said Friday.

Other activists criticise the ambiguity of the G8 statement, which does not set a clear timetable for the allocation of the new promised assistance, nor does it define how much of the sum would truly be fresh aid.

The Irish rock musician and anti-poverty campaigner Bono described this ambiguity as "a deliberate language of obfuscation. It is deliberately misleading. I am exasperated," the U2 frontman said.

In addition, the new pledge for targeting AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria does not fulfil the target estimated by the United Nations for the G8 countries, and which foresees a spending of 15 billion dollars per year through to 2010 on the HIV/AIDS fight alone.

Instead, the new aid promised at Heiligendamm commits the G8 countries to earmark about 12 billion dollars per year for all three diseases.

The G8 deal on cutting climate-changing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is also seen as a lip service to international environmental policy.

The group's joint statement on reducing GHG takes note of and expresses concern for "the recent IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] reports (which) concluded both, that global temperatures are rising, that this is caused largely by human activities and, in addition, that for increases in global average temperature, there are projected to be major changes in ecosystem structure and function with predominantly negative consequences for biodiversity and ecosystems, e.g. water and food supply."

But U.S. President George W. Bush and Russia's President Vladimir Putin agreed only to "seriously consider the decisions made by the European Union, Canada and Japan which include at least a halving of global emissions by 2050," according to the statement. "We commit to achieving these goals," the paper says.

For Christoph Bals, director of the environmental organisation Germanwatch, the agreement opens the door for an international negotiation towards a new GHG reduction regime, under the framework of the UN, and with the participation of the U.S. government. (The United States is not part of the Kyoto Protocol.)

But the statement is not binding, and further negotiations, starting at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change conference in Bali, Indonesia, scheduled for December, will be a first test of the U.S commitment, and that of the Asian giants --China and India -- to join the post-Kyoto process.

The G8 leaders also failed to re-launch the negotiations on international trade in the stalled Doha Round of the World Trade Organisation, and did not advance towards eliminating its member countries farm subsidies, which constitute one of the main obstacles for development in Africa and other developing regions.

These disappointments round out the image of an expensive, futile event, where G8 leaders only paid lip services to its own commitments, and who isolated themselves from demonstrators -- and the world -- with costs for security alone estimated at more than 135 million dollars.

Japan is slated to host the G8 summit in 2008.

Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/200706090062.html

At G8 Summit, Commitment on AIDS Treatment Threatened; Africa Needs Universal Access by 2010, not 50% Access

2007-06-06T13:46:00.000+07:00

By, Zambia National AIDS Network, Earthtimes.org, June 5, 2007

Today the UN Special Envoy for AIDS in Africa, Elizabeth Mataka, raised an alarm about a potential weakening of the international commitment for universal access to HIV/AIDS treatment.

Reports from inside the negotiations taking place prior to the G8 Summit in Germany suggest that some G8 countries favor a dramatic scaling back of the commitment to universal access to treatment, which was made two years ago.

Some delegations are urging that the G8's Communique include treatment targets that would represent only 50% coverage, that is, far less than universal coverage. In contrast, the G8 in 2005 committed to reaching universal access, which is defined as 80% coverage by UNAIDS. Between 10 and 12 million will need treatment by 2010, yet the same leaders are urging the Communique set a target of only "5 million in the next few years."

"Africa will suffer greatly if the commitment is scaled back," said Elizabeth Mataka, the UN Special Envoy for AIDS in Africa. Mataka is also currently the Executive Director of the Zambia National AIDS Network (ZNAN) and she represents non-governmental organizations from developing countries on the Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and serves as the Board's Vice-Chair.

"It is very disturbing to hear that some G8 countries are seeking to weaken the world's resolve on this issue," she continued. "Just as we are trying to energize the global response to reach universal access, including by African governments themselves, the last thing we need is for the G8 to shift the goal posts."

"Communities have been mobilized towards voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), a critical entry point to prevention, and so we cannot hold back the tempo," Ms. Mataka said. "We have raised hopes and created demand, and we therefore have a more than moral obligation to ensure treatment for all."

"To achieve universal access the G8 should commit to provide US$30 billion in annual funding the UN says is needed for HIV/AIDS programs by 2010. They should also reaffirm their commitment to fully replenish the Global Fund at a level of between US$6 billion and US$8 billion by 2010," said Ms. Mataka. Zambia National AIDS Network

Elizabeth Mataka, +260-1-256789, +260-1-256791-2, mobile: +260-977-709665, liznmataka@zamnet.zm

Source: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,117410.shtml

WHO backs use of compulsory licensing

2007-05-25T10:10:00.000+07:00

By, Pennapa Hongthong, The Nation, May 25, 2007

The annual meeting of all 193 member states of the World Health Organisation (WHO) ended yesterday in Geneva with a resolution to endorse the use of compulsory licensing to increase access to medicines.

The resolution came after a 10-hour heated debate between developed and developing countries. The resolution was welcomed by Thailand and Brazil as it was the first official WHO stance on the controversial issue since Thailand utilised the World Trade Organisation's (WTO) agreement on overriding intellectual property rights last November, followed by Brazil recently.

In its statement released yesterday, the WHO said its assembly resulted in commitments from its director-general to provide technical and policy support to countries to use compulsory licences to make existing medicines more accessible and to draw up a global strategy and plan of action on the issue.

"I am fully committed to this process and have noted your desire to move forward faster... We must make a tremendous effort. We know our incentive: the prevention of large numbers of needless deaths," said Margaret Chan, the WHO's director-general, in the statement.

A representative of Thailand's Public Health Ministry who attended the assembly said the resolution was very good news for Thailand.

"We have fought to the last minute to convince other countries to agree with us," said the health official, who asked not to be named.

He said Thailand and Brazil, the only two countries to issue compulsory licences to manufacture cheap generic versions of expensive drugs, played crucial roles in the debate to support the resolution, while the United States led the opposition. The US, he said, was the only country to voice its dissent on the resolution and was angered when its words were not heeded by other countries.

He said the Public Health Ministry would officially announce the good news to Thais today.

The WHO's resolution came just three days after Thailand failed to clarify the use of compulsory licensing to the US government. The US commerce secretary took an aggressive stance and acted like a representative of US drug firms in demanding the cancellation of compulsory licences when Thai Health Minister Mongkol na Songkhla met him on Monday in Washington.

Kannikar Kijtiwatchakul, a campaigner from Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Belgium in Thailand, said the resolution was a great success for developing countries in their battle to get access to medicines.

"The fundamental problems of high drug prices caused by the reliance on patents for research and development on drugs should be explored as a next step," she said.

Kannikar claimed that the assembly also adopted a resolution to explore R&D incentive mechanisms and to address the link between R&D costs and the price of medicines, vaccines and diagnostic kits.

Besides agreements on public health, innovation and intellectual property rights, the WHO's member states also reached resolutions on pandemic influenza preparedness and access to vaccines and other benefits that would be shared among the members.

Chan, head of the WHO, said the sharing would flow from improved international cooperation and preparation.

The resolution requires the WHO to establish an international stockpile of vaccines for H5N1 bird-flu and other influenza viruses of pandemic potential and to formulate mechanisms and guidelines aimed at ensuring fair and equitable distribution of vaccines at affordable prices.

U.N. reaffirms commitment to goals for HIV prevention and treatment

2007-05-23T11:11:00.000+07:00

By, The China Post, May 23, 2007

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he believes progress is possible to halt and begin to reverse the spread of AIDS globally by 2015 _ despite a rising rate of infection that means 12,000 people are diagnosed with the HIV virus daily.

"Make no mistake: in some way or another, we all live with HIV. We are all affected by it. We all need to take responsibility for the response," he told a General Assembly session reviewing the U.N. response to the epidemic Monday.

Last year, U.N. member states renewed pledges and set a new global goal to have universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support by 2010. One of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals agreed to by world leaders at a summit in September 2000 calls for halting and starting to reverse the spread of HIV by 2015.

Monday's session was organized to review the goals' progress.

"In the course of a quarter of a century, HIV has infected 65 million people, and killed 25 million," Ban said. "Today, 40 million people are living with HIV. Almost half of them are women. More women _ including married women _ are living with HIV than ever before."

According to U.N. statistics, there were 2 million people receiving treatment in 2006, representing 28 percent of the estimated 7.1 million people in need, an increase of 700,000 from 2005.

But the report showed that the rate of infection continues to increase.

An estimated $18 billion (13.4 billion) is needed in 2007 and $22 billion (16.4 billion) in 2008 to achieve universal access to prevention and treatment programs in low- and middle-income countries, according to the United Nations.

Ban said ensuring access to treatment, prevention, care and support is "critical" to achieving the goal of halting and reversing the AIDS epidemic _ and this means tackling diseases associated with HIV especially tuberculosis, investing in vaccines and microbicides to prevent and treat the virus and ensuring full funding.

"It means mustering the political will to address the factors that drive the epidemic _ including gender inequality, stigma and discrimination," he said.

Ban stressed that fighting AIDS will remain a U.N. priority and that he will make every effort to mobilize funding.

"If we have learned one lesson beyond any other in the past 25 years, it is surely this: only when we work together with unity of purpose can we defeat AIDS _ unity among governments, the private sector and civil society," the secretary-general said.

General Assembly President Sheikha Haya Rashed Al Khalifa spoke not only of the growing number of women living with the disease, an estimated 17 million worldwide, but the devastating impact on their lives.

"Many women would rather not get the treatment they need to save their lives, or stop their children from contracting HIV/AIDS because they do not want, or do not know how to cope with the fear and stigma of HIV/AIDS," she said.

On Monday, the secretary-general appointed Elizabeth Mataka, the executive director of the Zambia National AIDS Network, as his special AIDS envoy for Africa. He also renewed appointments for Dr. Nafis Sadik as the U.N. AIDS envoy for Asia, Lars Kallings as the envoy for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and Sir George Alleyne for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Source: http://www.chinapost.com.tw/latestnews/2007522/46307.htm

Tripling of Aids Spending Demanded

2007-05-18T10:41:00.000+07:00

By, ActionAid UK, One world, May 18, 2007

* 18-19 May annual meeting of G8 finance ministers in Potsdam, Germany

G7 countries must immediately triple their annual HIV and Aids spend to the developing world, if they are to meet the historic Gleneagles commitment of prevention, treatment and care for all who need it by 2010, campaigners have warned.

The international anti-poverty agency ActionAid has written to the G7 finance ministers, who gather in Potsdam, Germany at the end of this week, urging them to fill the $8bn to $10bn annual funding gap that prevents a full-scale assault on the epidemic.

Although Aids is scheduled for discussion at June's G8 summit, it is not on the finance ministers' agenda this week. ActionAid is concerned that consequently pledges made at the 2005 G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, will never become reality.

ActionAid campaigner Nick Corby said: "It is the job of finance ministers to unlock funds. Our research shows just what a huge gap there is between what is needed and what is being delivered.

"The G8 cannot move on Aids without the finance being in place, and that requires a comprehensive funding plan that is long term, sustainable and predictable."

Two years on from Gleneagles, and with less than three weeks to go before the G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, three quarters of people who need treatment in low and middle income countries are not receiving it. Nearly 90 per cent of HIV-positive pregnant women are still unable to get drugs that could prevent the virus being passed on to their child.

"Without proper funding, the world will not even make a dent in the appalling 8,000 Aids deaths a day and the 12,000 new HIV infections. Those statistics are a shocking indictment of the indifference of the world's richest countries to the suffering of millions," said the head of ActionAid's HIV and Aids campaign, Aditi Sharma.

The figures

On 2005 figures, the UK is the second largest governmental donor to HIV and Aids projects, yet its spending must increase by a third to deliver its fair share of the funds needed in 2007. Germany must increase its spending five-fold.

Canada needs to commit an extra US$134 million a year

France needs to commit an extra US$682 million a year

Germany needs to commit an extra US$895 million a year

Italy needs to commit an extra US$490 million a year

Japan needs to commit an extra US$1,947 million a year

The UK needs to commit an extra US$231 million a year

The US needs to commit an extra US$4,009 million a year

ENDS

Source: http://us.oneworld.net/article/view/149327/1/3319

Ethiopia: U.S. Earmarks $ 250 Million for HIV/Aids Fight

2006-11-08T09:38:00.000+07:00

By, The Daily Monitor (Addis Ababa), November 7, 2006

The United States government will donate a sum of 250 million USD (nearly 2 billion ETB) to help combat HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia, its Charge d'Affairs announced on Monday.

The announcement was made at the opening of a two-day national symposium that discussed successes and challenges so far in use and management of Anti-Retroviral Treatment (ART) in Ethiopia.

"This year we will give another $ 250-around 2 billion Birr- million for the ongoing efforts to fight HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia, country challenged by the epidemic," Ambassador Vikki Huddleston the US Charge d'Affaires said adding that it was only together, that we can challenge this problem." Only together, we can challenge this problem," The Ambassador said the country was one of the 15 beneficiary countries in the world, which is receiving "huge" amount of money from The US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the PEPAR" She indicated that during the past three years Ethiopia received $ 250 million from the fund earmarked for the preventive works of HIV/AIDS.

The ambassador also reassured the US government's continued support to Ethiopia in the nation wide fight against the spread of HIV/AIDS in the future.

Ethiopia, the second largest populous country in the Sub-Sahara (with an estimated 75 million people) has since the past two years, been on the beneficiaries' list of the US fund-a five-year, $15 billion initiative to "turn the tide" in combating the global HIV/AIDS pandemic.

Dr.Tedros Adhanom, Minster of Health on his part said of ART's contribution in mitigating effects of the pandemic in the country and the ongoing efforts to reach the needy.

"ART has played a big role on the ongoing efforts to fight HIV/AIDS in our country. One year ago, when we start to give free ART, the number of people who were getting the treatment was only 900 while another 11,000 got the treatment with payment. Now we are able to increase the number to 55,900.But that is far from enough, and we have to do more to reach those in need of the treatment," the minister said.

According to Tewodros, the number of people who are in need of ART in the country is estimated to be about 270,000 and there is a plan to give the treatment to 100,000 people till the end of 2006.

Currently, the ART is being given in 189 health facilities and 77 health centers throughout the country.

Around 43,000 out of the 270,000 people who are in need of ART are said to be children.

Dr. Tewodros said there is a plan to deliver the treatment to 263, 000 people by 2008.

The national symposium was organized by Walta Information Center (WIC), Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Johns Hopkins University.

Representatives of federal and regional government as well as NGOs working on the fight against HIV/AIDS are attending the two-day conference which will wind up today. Around 1.3 million people are estimated to live with HIV/AIDS in Ethiopia.

Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/200611070964.html

SOUTHERN AFRICA: Red Cross launches biggest ever AIDS appeal

2006-11-02T10:30:00.000+07:00

By, IRIN PlusNews, November 1, 2006

JOHANNESBURG - The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies launched an appeal on Wednesday to massively expand its anti-AIDS programme in Southern Africa over the next five years.

Speaking in Johannesburg, the Federation's new Special Representative for HIV and AIDS, Dr. Mukesh Kapila, urged international donor communities to move beyond rhetoric in meeting the needs of affected populations. The Federation is appealing for US$300 million to implement the expansion of its AIDS programme in the region.

With just a fraction of more than 12 million HIV-positive people in southern Africa currently accessing prevention, care and treatment services, the time for idly standing by and watching the pandemic exact its deadly toll, was over, said Kapila.

"We might have the human resources to quadruple our current programmes to reach 50 million people with prevention messages; over 460,000 orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) with support; and 250,000 infected people with home-based care, but our plan can only materialise if our appeal is met," he told IRIN/PlusNews.

The Red Cross estimates that 1 million people a year die of AIDS-related illnesses in the region, and that the number of OVCs is 4.6 million and climbing.

In preparation for its long-term plan, the Federation recently joined forces with key partners to compile and distribute easy-to-use training tool-kits for community-based volunteers struggling to provide services.

Françoise Le Goff, head of the regional delegation based in Harare, Zimbabwe, described this initiative as just one example of what the Federation could achieve with sufficient support over the next five years.

"Expansion of our efforts comes at a time when most governments [in the region] are yet to define targets for their own anti-AIDS campaigns, even more than 25 years into the pandemic," she said.

The new programme would include a focus on reducing stigma and discrimination and tackling gender-based violence.

"Today is a historic moment for our organization, being the first time ever that we are committing so many resources to tackling the long term development problem that is AIDS," Goff noted.

Echoing Le Goff's sentiments, Mandisa Kalako-Williams, president of the South Africa Red Cross Society, said that for too long scores of HIV-positive people in the country have been falling through the cracks due to inadequate human resources and support.

"This scaling-up of the Federation's activities could help alleviate the bottle-neck created by people desperately seeking care at public health facilities already buckling under the pressure. More importantly, this appeal will help expand these life-prolonging interventions beyond urban centres to the all too often overlooked rural communities," Kalako-Williams commented.

Angola, Malawi, South Africa, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe are among the 10 countries that stand to benefit from the Federation's expanded AIDS programme.

hh/ks/tdm

The Johannesburg Position on HIV/AIDS and Women's and Girls' Rights in Africa

2006-10-11T11:55:00.000+07:00

We, African women including HIV positive women, women's rights activists, feminists, scholars, professionals, community workers and policy makers from the African continent participating in the African Women's Regional Consultation on Women's and Rights and HIV/AIDS in Africa, in Johannesburg, South Africa, April 6-7, 2006 are:

Deeply concerned that despite various interventions aimed at prevention, care, support and treatment of HIV and AIDS, the global pandemic has had and continues to have a devastating impact on the lives of African women and girls;

Further concerned that in spite of the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on women and girls, governments are yet to recognise the centrality of promoting and protecting women's and girls' human rights in all HIV and AIDS interventions;

Mindful of the fact that the assault on women's human rights continues through various forms of violence against women and girls, including, but not limited to: rape, marital rape, domestic violence, trafficking, harmful customary and traditional practices, violence and torture during conflict, forced marriages and early marriages. These forms of violence take place: within homes, at work, in schools, in clinics and hospitals, at police stations and many other places and they are continuing and increasing at an alarming rate fuelling HIV infections amongst women and girls;

Recognising that violence against women and girls is a key driver of increased risk and vulnerability to HIV infection among African women and girls;

Aware that unequal power relations between women and men result in the inability of many African women and girls to negotiate safe and pleasurable sex;

Acknowledging that women living in militarised communities and zones of armed conflict face peculiar and heightened risks of HIV infection as a result of violence , sexual crimes and torture perpetrated against women and girls, in war and emergency situations or as refugees and internally displaced persons, with extremely limited protection of their human rights;

Further acknowledging that women's: low socio-economic status, lack of access to and control over empowering and emancipating resources such as land and property increases women's and girls' exposure to many dehumanising cultural norms, beliefs and practices that undermine women's and girls' emotional, spiritual and psychological well being, choices and agency, bodily integrity and self esteem and increase their vulnerability to HIV infection;

Noting with grave concern, that little investment has been made in securing women's and girls' sexual and reproductive health and rights in the context of a pandemic that robs many women of their choices related to childbearing and rearing, and the enjoyment of their full sexual rights;

Concerned that diminishing investments at the national and international level in the education of women and girls has an adverse effect on the ability of women and girls to access HIV and AIDS information, education and services that are critical for: the prevention of new infections, re-infections, for treatment and care knowledge and protection of women's and girls' human rights;

Further concerned that women and girls, and in particular; HIV positive women, women living with AIDS and orphaned girls, have been forced to become the backbone of the community, family based care and nursing systems; with limited knowledge and skills, without resources, remuneration or other forms of state support, further adding to their already disproportionate burden of care and support for PLWHA, in contexts of extreme poverty and inadequate state health services;

Dismayed that, notwithstanding the firm commitment to the indivisibility and interrelatedness of all human rights, and the crisis of HIV/AIDS in Africa, women's and girls' human rights are ignored by international financial and trade institutions-WTO, IMF, World Bank.

The aforementioned institutions urge African governments to withdraw investment from health; to privatise basic services such as health and to prioritise debt repayments in the face of two major pandemics in the continent-HIV/AIDS and violence against women. These multilateral donors are yet to commit significant resources to institutionalise women's rights as central pillars for halting the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa.

Mindful of the fact that both the Abuja Declaration on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and other Related Infectious Diseases of 2001 and the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS of 2001 are under review in 2006, presenting clear opportunities for heads of state and government to promote and protect African women's and girls' rights in order to mitigate the impact of the HIV and AIDS epidemic on women and girls, and to halt the pandemic in Africa by taking action to:

Reaffirm commitments heads of state and government have made through regional and international agreements on HIV&AIDS, and women's human rights, in particular, the Convention on Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) (1979);
Vienna Declaration on Human Rights (1993); International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD Plan of Action (1994); Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995), All the African Regional Conferences on Women; The Millennium Declaration (2000); Protocol to the African Charter on the Rights of Women in Africa (2003); Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa (2004) amongst others;

We acknowledge that limited progress has been made in the response to AIDS at global and national levels in respect of raising resources and extending access to services;

We Stress with deep concern that in spite of the various commitments to action, the provision of resources and the promotion and protection of the human rights of African women and girls, given the devastating scale and impact of the HIV and AIDS pandemic on African women and girls, there is need for renewed urgent actions, at all levels and in all sectors, to promote and protect the human rights of African women and girls.

We note with urgency that there is a critical need to move from rhetoric to action if we are to see a major change in the spread of the HIV and AIDS pandemic and its increasing and alarming feminisation.

We therefore urge all African heads of state and government and other relevant stakeholders to ensure the following:

1 Women's and Girls' Human Rights
African heads of state and government take all necessary measures to create a national and international community that places top priority on the development of policy, legislative and administrative environment in which the human rights of Africa women and girls, especially those living with HIV and AIDS are actively promoted, fully enjoyed and protected within and through national, regional and continental responses to violence against women and girls, and through HIV and AIDS policies, programmes and interventions.

2. Leadership and Accountability
We urge all African heads of state and government to provide the necessary leadership for the fulfilment of women's and girl's human rights in the context of HIV and AIDS.
We urge all African heads of state and government to bear full accountability for the commitments they have made to women's human rights as signatories to various national, continental and global women's and girls' human rights and HIV and AIDS agreements.
We urge African heads of state and government to be exemplary, in both their public duties and private lives on the matter of the promotion and protection of the human rights of African women and girls.

We call upon all African heads of state and government to intensify the protection of the rights of African women and girls by enacting and implementing laws that protect women from all forms of violence that increase the legal age of marriage for young girls and that protect women's and girls' access to, ownership of and control over resources, including land.

African heads of state and government should create mechanisms to provide solidarity and support that enable HIV positive women and girls can meaningful and effective participate in and provide leadership, by occupying strategic positions of leadership and power, to strengthen movements of women living with HIV and AIDS so that their voices are heard loudly and clearly on issues affecting HIV positive women.

They should further address policy and legal gaps that exist with regards to discriminatory, statutory, customary and religious laws that deny women and girls their full and equal rights and increasing their vulnerability to HIV infection and burden of AIDS. These include but are not limited to enactment and implementation of laws against violence against women and girls, for land and property rights and women's and girls' sexual and reproductive rights.

3 HIV and AIDS Programme Interventions
African heads of state and government strengthen HIV and AIDS programming by giving pivotal priority to women's and girls' rights in:

Prevention strategies, in particular, expand the current prevention paradigm to promote and protect women's and girls' sexual and reproductive rights, legislate and implement interventions that protect against violence against women and girls, legislate and implement property and inheritance rights of women and girls, ensure access to appropriate and evidenced based prevention information, provide PEPs to all women and girl survivors of sexual violence and invest in fast tracked development of microbicides.

Treatment. Ensure that women and girls have access to, appropriate, free and comprehensive treatment-including but not limited to nutrition-services on HIV and AIDS. Further ensure that women and girls have an equitable share of treatment services.

Remove social and institutional barriers that prevent women and girls from accessing HIV and AIDS treatment and services, including violence they face as a result of their status
Expand PMTCT interventions beyond protecting the foetus to include comprehensive pre and post natal treatment of women.

Ensure interventions such as VCT and PMTCT do not contribute to increased risk of women and girls to stigma and violence.

Care. Invest in reducing the burden of care on women and girls through programmes that provide enhanced access to palliative care and that compensate women and girls equitably for their contribution.

Prioritise the strengthening of health services and infrastructure through adequate resources to reduce the burden of care and medical costs of HIV and AIDS on women and girls in Africa.
Ensure that women's access to appropriate treatment and care facilities is scaled up, especially rural areas, where a majority of African women live.

Given the limited resources African governments are directing to public health care, in part because of the aid restrictions and conditionality of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, governments should take back their mandate and responsibility to provide quality, affordable public health care to its citizens so as to effectively eliminate the burden on women and girls of home based care.

Further governments should compensate women and girls for the care work they perform in respect of HIV and AIDS as this burden takes women and girls away from other forms of economically productive and income earning activities.

End the bias that currently exists in AIDS treatment programmes which, especially in the commercial sector, benefit predominately male work forces, by ensuring that HIV positive women and girls have access to treatment as citizens in their own right.

Provide sex disaggregated data clearly illustrating how women and girls are benefiting equally in care programmes and access to health facilities that are specifically designed to address women's care and treatment requirements.

4 Resources
That all African heads of state and government increase investment and resources for the protection and promotion of women's and girls' rights, concerns and priorities in HIV and AIDS at the national, regional, continental and international levels through the following mechanisms:

Specific Women's and Girls' Resource Facility from existing global funding mechanisms targeted at ensuring that women and girls have access to and control over HIV and AIDS resources, with clear, pro-HIV positive women policy guidelines for the management and disbursement of the resources that formulates specific guidelines of the kinds of resource disaggregation.

Ensure that from this facility governments establish resources targeted at prevention mechanisms that enhance women's human rights, such as, programmes that are aimed at preventing violence against women through:

* strengthening the role of the police force in preventing violence against women;
* the raising of consciousness among women and girls against violence
* strengthening the role of the judiciary in preventing violence against women by providing a clear legislative frame work criminalizing violence against women and girls and providing training on approaches to criminalization of violence against women in the context of HIV and AIDS;
* Ensure that special resources are availed for the protection of the rights of sex workers from violence.

Develop, at continental level, a HIV specific target within the Abuja commitment to allocating 15 per cent of national budgets on health, of which at least 50 per cent must directly address rights of African women and girls.

Ensure that all forthcoming international financing commitments on HIV and AIDS, made to global, continental and national initiatives, at a minimum channel 50 per cent of all resources to programmes that protect women and girls from rights violations, for instance, violence against women.

Targeted support for women's organizing at local and community levels. Providing financing for the development of sustainable, viable and independent initiatives that ensure HIV positive women and girls have access to prevention, treatment, care and support that is designed specifically for their needs and requirements as citizens.

Scaling up HIV and AIDS Special Efforts and Interventions Proven to be Effective in Preventing New Infections in Women and Girls. These include universal access to Post Exposure Prophylaxis (PEP), programmes aimed at the prevention of parent to child transmission and extending the lives of mothers (PPTCT+) and fast tracking the development of microbicides, vaccines and other new women-controlled technologies.

Ensure that resources are availed to enable women to access VCT facilities that are specifically designed to provide information and services that are appropriate to female clients with HIV and AIDS related queries of a specifically feminised nature

Ensure that there is widespread access to Post Exposure Prophylaxis for women who have been exposed to HIV transmission through acts of sexual violence and aggression

Promoting and Protecting Women's and Girls' Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights. Ensure that women in their own individual right as citizens have access to appropriate services that address their reproductive health and care needs beyond the limited frame of child birth and pregnancy, as there is increasing evidence of opportunistic infections of a reproductive health nature being witnessed in women who many not necessarily be pregnant or in child birth.
Scaling up Broad-based Women's and Girls' Rights Programmes. Particularly in areas known to minimize women's and girls' vulnerability to HIV infection, including but not limited to: prevention of violence against women and girls and promotion of women's and girls' sexual and reproductive health and rights, expanding girls' access to education, increased access to and control over land and property and economic empowerment.

5. International Institutions of Development
We stress the need for international institutions whose policies and interventions have a strong impact on the social and economic position of African women and girls to actively advance and protect the human rights of women and girls as outlined in international norms and standards, as they are intrinsic to halting the HIV/AIDS pandemic, in all their policies and programmes.

Their policies discouraging governments from investing in social services, particularly health, and privatisation of basic services should stop to reduce the burden of care and cost for HIV/AIDS on African women and girls.

International institutions must in particular pay due heed to the rights of African women and girls living with HIV and AIDS by ensuring that they have administrative and policy procedures that respect and protect the human rights of HIV positive African women and girls.

Conclusion
We, African women are profoundly concerned and aggrieved that it has taken so long for governments to fully appreciate the centrality of African women's rights and voices in dealing with HIV/AIDS, which is one of the greatest threats to our collective existence as a people and the continent. As African women, we demand meaningful participation and involvement in institutions and processes that shall guide the global responses to HIV and AIDS. As women of Africa, we fully commit ourselves to working with our heads of state and government and other stakeholders to mitigate the impact of HIV and AIDS on African women and girls, the continent and the world. Women's rights are not negotiable. The women and girls of Africa deserve more.
The time to act is now!

Signed: ActionAid International, African Union, Akina mama Wa Afrika, ANERELA, AWDF, AWID, CIRDDOC Nigeria, COMESA, COVAW – Kenya, EANNASO, Empinsweni Aids Centre, EQULALITY NOW, FAMEDEV, FEMNET, FIDA – Ghana, GAMCOTRAP, Gender AIDS Forum, ICW/ FOCAGIFO, INCRESE, Nigeria, MRC, Musasa Project, National Human Rights Commission – Abuja, OPIC, OSISA, Positive Women's Network, SAFAIDS, SWAA – Nigeria, SWAA - Sierra Leone, SWAA International, SWAPOL, TAC, The Women's Trust, UNIFEM, WASN, WLSA, WOLDDOF - Sierra Leone, Women in Law & Development (WILDAF), Women's Aid collective (WACOL), World YWCA - Geneva Switzerland, WSCF, YWLN

UNGASS Statement on TB and HIV/AIDS

2006-10-06T14:53:00.000+07:00

The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (IUATLD)on the occasion of the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS

Commends the allocation of global funds for the care, treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS,tuberculosis and other infectious diseases as a necessary response to the devastating health and economic burden that many low-income countries bear due to these diseases.

IUATLD wishes to emphasise that:

· The Tuberculosis (TB) and AIDS epidemics are inextricably linked…

o TB is the most common opportunistic infection in people with AIDS
o TB is the first manifestation of AIDS in over 50% of cases in developing countries
o TB is the leading killer of people with AIDS

…we cannot hope to stop one epidemic without stopping the other.

· Curing TB in HIV/AIDS patients will immediately improve their quality of life and prevent further transmission of TB.

. Unlike HIV/AIDS, a low-cost cure already exists for TB and is being provided in the context of the internationally accepted DOTS strategy – expansion of DOTS is an urgent global priority.

· Success in TB control has been largely dependent on the strength of the whole health care system – investing in comprehensive strategies is crucial for the fight against TB and AIDS.

· A “Global TB Drug Facility” has recently been launched by the Stop TB partnership, a partnership hosted by WHO. It will facilitate access to TB drugs for countries with a high prevalence of TB to support DOTS expansion.

· Undue pharmaceutical and trade interests should be excluded from these global commitments to providing access to treatment, which should be considered as a basic human right.

IUATLD therefore requests that in the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS:

Ø TB be specifically recognised as the most common opportunistic infection,which has a major impact on the health and lives of people with HIV/AIDS, yet can be cured at low cost.

Ø Expansion and improvement of the DOTS strategy for TB control, including the support of the Global TB Drug Facility, be acknowledged as an integral part of our efforts to confront the TB and AIDS epidemics and funds be allocated accordingly.

Source: http://www.tballiance.org/pdf/ungass_stmt.pdf

In absolute silence, a protest against lack of treatment for AIDS

2006-10-06T00:23:00.000+07:00

One World News- South Asia, June 4, 2006

INDIA- Scores of people participated in a silent protest in the south Indian state of Chennai as part of

Global AIDS Week of Action (May 20-26). They demanded the distribution of protein-enriched, nutritious food through the

public distribution system for people living with HIV/AIDS.

They also wanted facilities for treatment of opportunistic infections and provision of anti-retroviral (ARV) therapy in

primary health centres in the State. The protesters wore black masks and demanded CD4 count testing centres in all districts

so that people could get tested every three months and avail themselves of ARV therapy without delay.

The protesters, comprising people living with HIV/AIDS, transgender people, sex workers and homosexuals, wanted assurances

that infected children would be admitted in schools. NGOs take part Representatives of the 10 non-government organisations

that participated in the protest held on Friday in front of the Government State Guest House in Chepauk, wanted insurance

cover for people infected with the virus and demanded building women's capacity to help them support themselves

economically.

The NGOs working with the infected people and the affected population want to use the Global AIDS Week of Action and UNGASS

as an opportunity to press the government to deliver on its promise that it would implement the schemes proposed in 2001.

At the United Nations General Assembly Special Session to be held from May 31 to June 2 in New York, participants will

review the action taken by governments across the world to prevent the spread of the disease. A.Sankar, executive director

of Empower, who is participating in the UNGASS meet as a civil society representative, said:

"Currently all the funding comes from international organisations." "The Central government merely distributes the funds to

various state AIDS control societies. The State should set apart some amount for AIDS." he said.

Source: One World South Asia

Uganda: HIV Policy Launched

2006-10-03T11:48:00.000+07:00

TWELVE-year-old Anabel Asasira dreamt of finishing school, getting married and raising her own family one day.

The problem is; she contracted HIV/AIDS from her mother.

A solution to problems like hers was the cause of the gathering of health experts on Friday at Kabira Country Club in Kampala, to launch the revised Prevention of Mother-to-Child Transmission (PMTCT) of HIV policy.

The new policy is a shot in the arm for Uganda's HIV infected mothers, as it brings a holistic approach that further reduces the risk of HIV transmission to the baby, while addressing HIV-related care needs of the mother and her family.

Under the policy, HIV-positive pregnant women and their families will be counselled and provided with appropriate HIV care, and their babies will be tested and offered follow-up care and support.

Health minister Dr. Stephen Malinga captured the gravity of the issue when he said 25,000 children per year risked Asasira's fate, if there is no timely intervention.

"The goal of PMTCT is to achieve a new generation free of HIV/AIDS. This is a great undertaking requiring the participation of all stakeholders.

"The majority of children acquire HIV through Mother-to-Child transmission. That is why the Government embraces all methods of PMTCT. Care and support for all HIV-positive mothers and their children will be a priority," he said.

He said strategies to address the emotional, psychological and spiritual needs of sufferers will equally be addressed through family support groups.

Present at the function was the Elizabeth Glazer Pediatric Foundation country chief, William Salmond, Centre for Disease Control's Jordan Tappero, UNICEF's Dr. Richard Oketch and USAID mission chief Margot Ellis.

Health services director general Dr. Sam Zaramba said PMTCT was important in eliminating HIV transmission, adding that he would like mother-to-child transmission to end.

Uganda Aids commission's John Rwomushana said it is paradoxical that Uganda, which contributed to the formulation of PMTCT is lagging behind in its implementation.

Source: Cyprian Musoke and Fred Ouma, New Vision (Kampala), September 24, 2006

http://allafrica.com/stories/200609250469.html

866 000 waiting on ARV treatment in SA - UNAIDS and WHO

2006-09-20T16:11:00.000+07:00

Efforts to treat three million people by the end of this year are expected to fail with South Africa, India and Nigeria already falling well short of their targets.

A “3 by 5” progress report released by the World Health Organization and Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) this week revealed that South Africa had fallen short of its target by a staggering 866 000.

South Africa’s “unmet” need was by far the highest in the world followed by India (735 000) and Nigeria (598 000). Neighboring Zimbabwe had over 300 000 people waiting on treatment.

The report did praise South Africa for committing U$1-billion over the next three years to scaling up ART, by far the largest budget allocation of any low- or middle-income country.

Another positive was that the number of people receiving combination anti-retroviral therapy for HIV/AIDS in developing countries had more than doubled in the past 18 months – from 400 000 at the end of 2003 to about one million in June last year.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the region most severely affected by HIV, about 500 000 people are currently receiving ART, more than triple the number of people on the drugs in June 2004, and nearly double the number six months ago.

However, the report predicted that despite good overall progress it was unlikely to be fast enough to reach the target of treating three million people by the end of 2005.

As of June last year, 49 countries accounted for 87 percent of all adults and children living with HIV/AIDS globally, 78 percent of mortality from AIDS globally and 89 percent of people needing treatment in low- and middle-income countries.

Six countries comprised over 50 percent of treatment needs in low- and middle-income countries: Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.

Leading international medical journal, The Lancet commented that South Africa in particular needed to show its commitment to treating HIV positive people with anti-retrovirals if the “3 by 5” target was to be met. “

If the 3 by 5 programme had the political clout to influence South Africa alone to implement all its recommendations, where the necessary infrastructure largely exists, then the 3 million target would be more likely to be attained. Without South Africa on board, with its leadership position within Africa, 3 by 5 is but a pipe dream,” the editorial said.

Health minister Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang responded at the time stating that she would not be pressured into meeting United Nations HIV/AIDS treatment targets. “I don't want to be pushed or pressurized by a target of three million people on anti-retrovirals by 2005," she said.

"WHO set the targets themselves. They didn't consult us. I don't see why South Africa must be the scapegoat for not reaching the target," she said at the time.

This week’s report highlighted human resources as a critical focus area in the push to provide treatment. It acknowledged that effective responses to the epidemic in low- and middle-income countries had been greatly undermined by specific weaknesses in the area of human resources.

The WHO was looking towards implementing novel models of ART delivery, already used in Uganda and South Africa, in 30 countries by the end of 2005. This included the simplification of treatment regimens and clinical monitoring which allowed a shift from a doctor-centred model to one that relies on an expanded clinical team including nurses, clinic workers and people living with HIV/AIDS employed and trained to perform community outreach and treatment support.

“Today’s report emphasizes that while political, financial and technical support for ART scale-up have in some cases met or exceeded expectations, in others the prerequisites of a successful response are not fully in place,” UNAIDS and WHO said in a statement.

The “3 by 5” target, endorsed by all 192 WHO member states including South Africa, was intended as an interim step toward the goal of universal access to HIV treatment for those who need it. The target was based on what could be achieved if countries, donors, and international agencies were fully successful in expanding political will, mobilizing funding resources, and building health infrastructure and systems.

Source: Anso Thom, Centre for the Study of AIDS

ICAAP Civil Society Statement

2006-09-18T13:24:00.000+07:00

5 July 2005

The following statement presents the outcome of several meetings involving civil society organisations that took place during the 7th International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, held in Kobe, Japan, 1-5 July, 2005.

Members of civil society represented here welcome previous statements and commitments on HIV/AIDS by our governments. In particular we are grateful for the detailed commitments made in the following:

- The UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS- The Ministerial Statement from the Second Asia-Pacific Ministerial Meeting on HIV/AIDS held in Bangkok, Thailand on 11 July 2004

Together, these commitments present the essence of what we have been discussing all this week.

Every hour more than 148 Asians contract HIV, representing an abysmal failure to adequately address the prevention needs, particularly among vulnerable groups, including men who have sex with men, injecting drug users, sex workers, women and young girls, youth and mobile populations.

In the region, the number of people receiving ARVs has increased three-fold from 55,000 to 155,000 in the past 12 months. Despite this significant progress, the overall proportion of people in the region with advanced HIV infection receiving ARVs remains pitifully low, mirroring the global average of around 15%.

Further, the individual care needs of the 8.2 million men, women and children already living with HIV in the region presents a major future challenge that we are not adequately acknowledging or even openly discussing. Our national health systems are simply not ready to absorb this scale of even basic care needs.

The current gap in all kinds of HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and care provision in the region represents a common failure to meet the key government commitments we have highlighted.

We therefore demand that urgent action be taken by each of our governments and other leaders, to keep previous promises to provide comprehensive AIDS prevention, treatment and care services to our people, as those detailed in the UNGASS Declaration, We also demand that national health budgets adequately reflect the requirements of the national AIDS control programs.

We also insist that our leaders take immediate action to provide affordable, readily available care and treatment options to keep people alive while we are waiting for governments, international donors and other institutions to deliver on their ARV promises, including:

- Voluntary counselling and testing;
- Prevention and treatment of tuberculosis;
- Drugs to prevent/treat other opportunistic infections;
- Home- and community-based care services;
- Reduced HIV-related stigma, esp in health care;
- Pharmacotherapy therapy for injecting drug uses;
- Traditional healing and care approaches;
- Assured food security and micronutrient provision.

Finally, we welcome and wholeheartedly support one of the four major recommendations that UNAIDS proposed during this ICAAP Conference: Countries should increase support to civil society organizations’ involvement in national responses

- We therefore demand that our governments work in equal and meaningful partnership with civil society including people living with HIV and vulnerable populations in addressing the control of the epidemic.

In mid-2006 a comprehensive review of national performance against the specific targets laid out in the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS will be presented by each country, finally placing each of our leaders under an international HIV/AIDS spotlight of accountability.

In support of the UNGASS goals, the UNAIDS recommendation above, and in light of the national UNGASS review process taking place this year, we demand our governments to:

Immediately establish a formal mechanism for the receipt of written and/or orally presented information and reports from civil society organizations and PWHA organizations on declaration of commitment implementation in their countries as input for the national 2006 Progress Report.

Statement By:

Asia Pacific Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS
Asia Pacific Council of AIDS Service Organization
Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers
Asian Harm Reduction NetworkAP-Rainbow
Asia-Pacific Network of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgenders
AIDS Society of Asia Pacific Coordination of Action Research on AIDS and Mobility
AIDS Society of Asia Pacific

And the:

World AIDS Campaign, Massive Effort Campaign, Positive Women’s Network, and the other 250 partners of the AIDS-Care-Watch Campaign

Stop-AIDS in Asia…Keep the PROMISE. Thank you very much.

[Spoken by: Periasamy Kousalya from Positive Women’s Network, India - 5th July 2005]

Governments’ response to HIV/AIDS remains weak: A community evaluation shows a lack of access to HIV prevention and treatment and human rights prote

2006-09-15T15:37:00.000+07:00

International Council of AIDS Service Organizations, May 31, 2006

Toronto, CANADA – The world of diplomacy and politics seems to be ignoring the fact that there has been too little progress in reversing the global AIDS epidemic. As governments and civil society come together in New York on 1-2 June, it is clear that many governments are not implementing commitments they made in 2001.

The International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) released a report today, "Community monitoring and evaluation: Implementation of the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS".

The report, a summary of studies carried out in 14 countries – Cameroon, Canada, El Salvador, Honduras, Indonesia, Ireland, Jamaica, Morocco, Nepal, Nigeria, Peru, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, and South Africa - highlights the continuing failure of many governments to deliver on their commitments made in 2001.

The study, undertaken by community researchers, found that leadership at the country level is still lacking in most countries; domestic spending on HIV remains too low; and human rights abuses of vulnerable populations continue unabated, denying them access to services and effective tools for preventing HIV infection and to life-saving AIDS drugs that will keep them alive.

“Part of the problem is that many governments have become masters of the rhetoric of rights, with very little effort made in translating them into action. For example, having legal protections against the discrimination of people living with HIV, as many countries do, matters little if governments fail to enforce them. They matter even less while most people living with AIDS are allowed to die while life-saving drugs are kept out of their reach” says Kieran Daly, Director of Policy at ICASO.

This lack of progress in responding to HIV, highlighted in the summary report of the 14 community evaluations, is not a result of the lack of know-how. In 2006 - 25 years since AIDS was first reported - the world has most of the tools needed to reverse the global epidemic.

Unfortunately, many governments are refusing to use these tools. As noted in the UN Secretary General’s March 2006 report on progress in the global response since 2001, “many countries have failed to fulfill the pledges”.

The result is more than 20 million people newly infected with HIV and millions dead. The continued lack of funding and real government commitment to treatment leaves most of those with AIDS to die. People have a right to health, this means people living with HIV have a right to AIDS treatment. While access to antiretrovirals (AIDS drugs) has improved in all the countries evaluated, it is still far from what is needed.

The failure to fulfill the 2001 commitments is made all the worse because many countries have shown that infections can be averted and lives can be saved by implementing programs and interventions that are known to work.

In the recent Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Prevention Policy paper, it was noted that the world could avert 29 million new infections between 2002-2010 by the implementation of a comprehensive HIV prevention package. However, the country evaluations in the ICASO report highlights the fact that with continued human rights abuses, HIV will continue to spread.

As the community researcher in South Africa noted “there is still a huge divide between public policy and public practice that leaves many people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS vulnerable to human rights abuses and HIV infection.”

The key populations that are at most risk of being exposed to HIV are still being denied access to the services that will allow them to protect themselves and to maintain their health. Sex workers, women, injecting drug users, youth and men who have sex with men, and others are facing government sponsored and/or condoned discrimination with policies and laws that continue to undermine the response to HIV.“

ICASO categorically opposes any laws or policies that undermine best practice in public health and/or that violate human rights. This includes, but not limited to, ICASO’s opposition to the US Government’s anti-prostitution legislation that restricts funding and support for sex workers, and to other ideologically-based prevention policies such as abstinence-only approaches and restrictions on the availability of comprehensive sex education, condoms and harm reduction programs”, says Richard Burzynski, Executive Director of ICASO.

He adds that "such policies and restrictions only serve to undermine the response to HIV and to increase the fear, stigma and discrimination of those most vulnerable to exposure to HIV and those most marginalized in society."

The ICASO summary report concludes with 24 recommendations to UNAIDS, governments and civil society organizations on what needs to be done to improve the implementation of the Declaration of Commitment. It is possible.

With added political commitment to address the funding gap, fully implementing what we know works, and properly addressing human rights, the epidemic can be reversed.

A copy of the full report is available at www.icaso.org For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact: Kieran Daly, Director, Policy & Communications International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) Tel: +1 416 275 8413 Email: kierand@icaso.org

Moving Towards Universal Access: Asia Pacific Regional Civil Society Forum Meeting Notes

2006-09-15T14:14:00.000+07:00

UNAIDS, Bangkok, 25 August 2006

INTRODUCTION

The Regional Consultation in Pattaya and the High Level Meeting recognized and acknowledged that civil society is a critical partner in efforts towards achieving the goal of moving towards Universal Access. UNAIDS Regional Support Team for Asia and the Pacific (RST-AP) organized a Civil Society Forum on 25 August in Bangkok to follow up on the above-mentioned meetings leading up towards universal access. A total of 42 representatives of Regional Networks and NGOs working on HIV/AIDS in the region and some civil society partners from countries, attended the one-day meeting (please see participant list). Specifically, the consultation explored approaches and mechanisms for stronger participation of civil society.

Countries in Asia and the Pacific are in the process of developing national strategic plans and targets, as well as costing their operational plans. Once missed, this opportunity may not occur again within the next five years. These processes can be seen as a window of opportunity for meaningful involvement of the civil society to partner with the national authorities in setting ambitious targets to increase coverage for HIV prevention, treatment, care and support and achieving the goals of universal access.

KEY DISCUSSION POINTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The consultation focused on the following core areas.

1. The process of moving towards meaningful participation of civil society at the country level

A key concern shared and discussed at this consultation is the question of how to create an enabling environment and a suitable platform that will allow the civil society at the national and grassroots level to participate meaningfully in developing national strategic plans and setting targets at the country level. Below are the key recommendations.

1.1 Develop a framework for strong and meaningful civil society participation. This framework should address:

· minimum standards for civil society involvement (the forum proposed that the civil society develop the framework, and that this exercise be driven by in-country civil society).

· systematic and equitable representation of civil society, including people living with HIV and vulnerable groups[1] in the official mechanisms (e.g. national AIDS authority, CCM) and process of setting targets and developing national strategic plan, as well as operational plan including monitoring and evaluation.

1.2 Strengthen capacity of the civil society in both knowledge and skills.

· Knowledge – civil society at all levels need to fully understanding the concept and implications of Universal Access, and their roles

· Skills – skills for grassroots organizations to carry out effective interventions with vulnerable groups on a long term basis; skills to effectively advocate and to express their concerns and perspectives, and to negotiate, etc.

Participants noted that strengthening the capacity of civil society needs to be a long-term and on-going process that requires sufficient allocation of resources and technical support on an ongoing basis. Technical Support Facility (TSF) and AIDS Strategy and Action Plan Service (ASAP) of World Bank could be a resource which civil society can utilize to get technical assistance in capacity building.

1.3 Provide adequate preparation for civil society participation.

The forum raised the issue of pressure to perform and inadequate preparations and lead time given to civil society. For example, the civil society is expected to work with national authorities in setting targets but yet there is little preparation and unclear mechanisms as well as a tight deadline for civil society involvement at the country level.

Specific suggestions include:

§ translation of global policy, declarations and commitments into the local context and languages
§ briefing of civil society including familiarizing the civil society on relevant issues

1.4 Develop indicators to measure civil society participation.

It is important to measure civil society involvement in order to prove their accountability. The capacity of civil society must be strengthened so that they can be effectively involved in the monitoring and evaluation process, and take part in the national M&E mechanism.

1.5 Document structured case studies of how civil society organizations have been involved at the country and regional levels to help assess progress made and lessons learned.

Key follow up actions:

- Civil society representatives to initiate a country-led process to develop minimum standards for civil society involvement (Participants to identify lead person/s)
- Follow up with TSF Manager to utilize technical assistance in building capacity of civil society
- Communicate with civil society organizations at all level on the concept and implications of universal access, and their potential roles

2. Key targets for 2010

A working group of participants was tasked to identify a set of recommendations on targets, to be considered by the forum. A list of quantitative targets was prepared and discussed, according to the indicators listed in the annex to SG’s report and the 9 indicators for low and concentrated epidemic countries. A representative of the group reported back to the forum after lunch.

The group divided the key targets into two components: the Program itself and the Contributing factors. Prevention and Treatment, Care & Support fall under the program and Capacity building and Enabling environment fall under the Contributing factors.

2.1. The participants endorsed the following overall broad targets as most critical in making major impact.

Note: The following targets endorsed by participants at the regional civil society forum have been regrouped in line with the UNGASS targets and those indicated in the annex to the note by UN Secretary General on assessment by UNAIDS on universal access.
Please find attached the list of core targets as annex at the end of this report.

2.1.1. Prevention for most at-risk populations (MARPs) including children and young people
2.1.1.1.Service coverage - target 80%
2.1.1.2.Behaviour change - target 60%
2.1.2. ARV Treatment for those who need it - target 80% coverage of eligible population.

Recognizing the diversity of the epidemic and country realities, participants agreed that target setting should be a country led process. This principle also applies to the following indicators.

2.2. The participants proposed that the targets listed below need to be worked further at country level.

2.1.1. Prevention:
2.1.1.1. Coverage of Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT)
2.1.1.2. Coverage of prevention services to vulnerable population such as young people, women and children including access to PMTCT

2.2.2.Treatment, Care & Support:
2.2.2.1. Second and third line ARV
2.2.2.2. Treatment of Opportunistic Infections (OI)
2.2.2.3. Paediatric AIDS Treatment

2.2.3. Enabling Environment:
2.2.3.1. Civil society involvement/engagement (indicators to be suggested by civil society)
2.2.3.2. Accountability – Independent “watchdog” system
2.2.3.3. Resources – % of national budget for HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS to provide funding gap to Civil Society Organizations)
2.2.3.4. Earmarked budget for NGO capacity building
2.2.3.5.Stigma and discrimination – National policy and practice
2.2.3.6.The participants further felt that one of the key priorities for target setting is the need to establish baseline surveillance (both HSS and BSS) and size estimation of MARPs.

Note: All the above indicators under point 2.3. (except ‘resources’) are captured under the ‘National Composite Policy Index’ which reflect government’s support to the respective components.

Follow up actions:
- Through their country contacts, civil society representatives encourage grassroots and community-based organizations to participate in country universal process at all level.

- UNAIDS to synthesize what had been discussed at the forum in regards to target setting and share this with participants for their final feedback.

- Participants to give their final feedback on the list of targets within one week after receiving the meeting document.

3. Accountability

The Forum noted the need that all partners governments, civil society, UN, donors and other stakeholders - must be held accountable, and that in doing so, mutual accountability must be ensured. It is crucial that civil society organizations consult with and report back to their constituencies and be accountable to the communities they serve.

In order to perform effectively and to be accountable, civil society would require ongoing capacity building to empower themselves with the necessary skills and resources.

It was noted that civil society is by nature, representative of a diverse group that is not homogeneous, independent and autonomous, and that these values cannot be compromised. In addition, civil society must maintain transparency in its participation and operations.

3.1.Develop a mechanism to benchmark the capacity of civil society, to set own targets against minimum standards for civil society participation as well as the capacity of the civil society organizations. This process should build on the existing code of conduct for NGOs.

Follow up action:

- Identify/develop tools to measure civil society’s capacity in meeting the targets, and how they are being met.

4. UNAIDS role in promoting civil society engagement

The Forum made the following recommendations for the role of UNAIDS.

At the country level

4.1.Facilitate partnership between the national authority and civil society at the country level

· facilitate the establishment of autonomous civil society forums for discussion/ collaboration, linked with government forums, involving as many and as diverse civil society organizations as possible
· support, if and as necessary, civil society consortium or similar mechanism to collectively identify representatives through inclusive and transparent process to express their shared voice and concerns in dialogue with government
· bridging with the government, ensuring that civil society representatives are involved meaningfully in consultation and decision making mechanisms as well as implementation level
· encourage the national authority to create mechanisms for civil society involvement in the national process (e.g. representation in official mechanisms such as the Country Coordinating Mechanism)
· support civil society in developing a framework and guiding principles for civil society involvement

4.2.Share information and facilitate actions following meetings, consultations and other developments among the civil society through ongoing communications.

The Forum suggested that UNAIDS appoints a staff to be a focal point for follow-up with civil society (Social Mobilization Officer or staff member who is covering the area).

4.3.Support resource mobilization efforts by and for civil society and to coordinate with donors and government to make sure civil society get equitable access to funds

4.4.Facilitate involvement of civil society in M&E and capacity building among national NGOs and community-based organizations

Regional level

4.5. Advocate with and build capacity of government partners about engaging with civil society in scaling up towards universal access

4.6.Advocacy with donor agencies for development of evidence-based policy and priorities

4.7.Support resource mobilization efforts by and for civil society

Follow-up

§ UNAIDS RST will send information on the division of labour among the UN agencies to the participants.

§ UNAIDS RST will communicate with its Country Coordinators and national authorities to support civil society participation at the country level.

§ UNAIDS to share focal point for civil society contact at the country level (Social Mobilization Officers and staff members who are taking a similar role)

§ UNAIDS requested participants, particularly those who work at the regional level, to support national and grassroots civil society organizations to participate as partners at the national level.

Conclusion

The process: The participants were engaged on the issue of participation of civil society in the target setting process at the countries. Many expressed the lack of confidence in governments engaging them as equal partners in the target setting and the NSP preparation process, as evidenced by the experiences they shared.

Many of them are apprehensive about the process and feel that their participation will still be tokenistic and one of routine consultation at some stage in the whole process. The participants believe that the onus is on governments to establish mechanisms and provide opportunities for civil society to be meaningfully engaged.

Many of them strongly expressed that unless UNAIDS plays a supporting role and that of an honest broker, this process will end up in tokenism. UNAIDS should relook at its role in a new light and emphasize the process as much as the targets themselves in this entire exercise.

The representatives from the Pacific cited the low representation and participation from the Pacific in the regional processes related to UA. They expressed the need to address this gap in future regional consultations and meetings especially those covering the Asia-Pacific region.

Target setting: Target setting appeared to be of secondary concern for the civil society participants - the entire emphasis placed on the extent of civil society involvement in the consultation process.

A list of quantitative targets was prepared and discussed in the meeting. This list was prepared keeping in view the indicators listed in the annex to SG’s report and the nine indicators for low and concentrated epidemic countries. The participants have agreed to give their final feedback on the list in a week’s time after receiving the meeting document.

It was agreed that target setting would be a country led process, but some broad indicators on coverage of vulnerable populations for behavior change, coverage of eligible HIV positive persons by ARV treatment and the extent of scale up of resources for national programmes would be agreed at the regional level in keeping with the consensus arrived at in the Regional consultations at Pattaya in February 2006.

Capacity building:

If the scale up of prevention and treatment interventions have to reach the scale that is needed for Universal Access, one of the main impediments is the lack of sustainable and ongoing capacity building of people living with HIV, grass roots NGOs and community organizations, to implement HIV programmes as well as participate in national and regional consultation processes.

The participants felt that very little was done to build capacity at that level by Governments, the various UN agencies involved and also the INGOs and other stakeholders operating at national level. The participants identified this as a major obstacle which needs to be overcome and UNAIDS need to keep this as a priority in their future planning of work.

******************
ANNEX

Targets for Universal Access by 2010

-Low and Concentrated Epidemic Countries in Asia and Pacific region

1. 80% of most-at-risk populations reached by prevention programmes (eg: outreach services, condom promotion, drug substitution treatment, needle exchange, etc).
2. 60% of behavioural change of most-at-risk populations
a) Percentage of most-at-risk populations who both correctly identify ways of preventing the transmission of HIV and reject major misconceptions about HIV transmission
b) Percentage of female and male sex workers reporting the use of a condom with their most recent client
c) Percentage of men reporting the use of a condom the last time they had anal sex with a male partner
d) Percentage of injecting drug users who have adopted behaviours that reduce transmission of HIV, i.e., who avoid using non-sterile injecting equipment or use methadone substitution treatment and use condoms, in the last 12 months (for countries where injecting drug use is an established mode of HIV transmission)
3. 80% of eligible people living with AIDS to be receiving antiretroviral combination therapy. Follow-up with second and third line ARVs to be fully covered.
4. Resource mobilized by Government (both from domestic and international sources) fully meets the prevention and treatment targets, or at least 3 times increase from that in 2005.
5. Enabling environment
a) Civil society engagement
i. Percentage of members in National AIDS Coordinating body (including CCM) who represent sectors of civil society
ii. Percentage of National AIDS Response budget earmarked for programmes partnering civil society, including capacity building and management support
b) Fight against AIDS related Stigma and Discrimination
i. National legislation to address stigma, discrimination, rights of infected and affected population.
6. % of HIV+ pregnant women receiving a complete course of ARV prophylaxis to reduce the risk of MTCT
7. % of orphan and vulnerable children (OVC) who received a basic external support package (eg: School fee, shelter and food)
8. Reduction of new infections in the next five years as an outcome

Note: No.1-3 are non-negotiable quantitative targets as agreed in the Regional Consultation on Universal Access at Pattaya in February 2006 and the civil society consultation in August 2006 in Bangkok

[1] sex workers, MSM, drug users, transgender, and other vulnerable groups

Kenya: Progress On HIV Parent-to-Baby Transmission, But UNGASS Target Still Elusive

2006-09-14T15:47:00.000+07:00

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks, May 24, 2006

NAIROBI- The comprehensive HIV/AIDS care clinic at Kenya's Machakos District Hospital buzzes with activity as nurses call out the names of the tens of women waiting - proof, according to the hospital's staff, that their efforts to reduce the number of children born with the virus are paying off."

As you can see, the clinic is full of people - uptake of VCT [voluntary counselling and testing], ARVs [antiretroviral treatment] and PMTCT [prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission]are all on the rise," said Dr Simon Mueke, the hospital's medical superintendent.

Machakos, a town about 50km east of the capital, Nairobi, on the Nairobi-Mombasa highway, has been badly affected by the ongoing drought.

At the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on HIV/AIDS five years ago, world leaders committed to ensuring that 80 percent of pregnant women would have access to HIV prevention services.

Although Kenya has not met the 2001 target, the government feels they have improved access to PMTCT services."

We now have between 40 and 50 percent of all HIV-positive expectant mothers accessing PMTCT, and have trained thousands of health workers," said Dr Robert Ayisi, PMTCT coordinator at the Kenya's National AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections Control Programme (NASCOP).

Mueke noted that HIV testing at the Machakos antenatal clinic was now a standard part of the package, unless a woman specifically declined.

According to Margaret Kibutu, a PMTCT nurse at the hospital, "This year, since January, we have tested more than 600 women at the antenatal clinic, the highest figure since we started in 2003."

Despite these advances, challenges remain. "We need to develop the community component of PMTCT - we have services at the district level, but need them at the lower levels to ensure that all women have access to them," Ayisi commented.

MORE ACTION NEEDED

More health workers, particularly in the rural areas, were required if a higher PMTCT uptake was to be achieved. "We are currently training traditional birth attendants in PMTCT," Ayisi said."

We want them to be our agents of change and pass the messages to mothers."

Ahead of the UNGASS review in June, the Kenyan government has recommended that donor countries take into consideration local traditions and cultural practices, such as traditional birth attendants, and make their policy documents more Afro-centric in order to incorporate valuable service providers.

Traditional birth attendants are more often present at deliveries than trained medical staff, and the government is encouraging them to join the fight against HIV by reducing the levels of stigma faced by HIV-positive women, among other services.

The stigma attached to HIV/AIDS often causes infected women not to follow the PMTCT guidelines, such as not breastfeeding, with which an infant has a 15 percent to 30 percent chance of contracting HIV.

"If you don't breastfeed your child, people wonder why, and conclude that you must be positive - this leads many women to carry on breastfeeding and putting their children at risk," said nurse Kibutu.

Poverty also led women to carry on breastfeeding because they could not afford replacement foods. Parts of Kenya are still gripped by a drought brought on by several failed rainy seasons, and baby formula is often unaffordable to the 56 percent of Kenyans living on less than US$1 per day.

Formula feeding reduces the risk of transmission via breastmilk by one-third. But this option presents another obstacle, as it requires a constant supply of clean water and firewood to ensure sterile feeding. Family pressure to breastfeed is strong, and mothers who formula feed are viewed with suspicion.

The alternative is solely breastfeeding for the first three to six months, followed by quick weaning, as mixed feeding can damage the baby's fragile gut lining, increasing the risk of infection."

We now tell these women to try to breastfeed exclusively for six months if they cannot afford the [formula] milk - that way they do not introduce foreign foods that might disagree with the baby and increase the risk of infections," Kibutu said.

Stigma also heightened the lack of male participation in mother-child healthcare, further hindering the development of PMTCT. "Most men are very arrogant and do not want to hear about testing," she observed. "We only get men in the clinic once in a while, but PMTCT is really a family issue - the men should be involved."

Kibutu said many women failed to take their ARVs because they had not disclosed their HIV status to their spouses, which put them and their families at even greater risk. In response to the need for greater male participation, Machakos hospital has started including a 'Men As Partners' component in their PMTCT services."

Men need to be involved in PMTCT, since they have more say in what happens in their homes," said Alice Wambugu, an HIV-positive behaviour-change volunteer with Population Services International (PSI), an AIDS prevention NGO.

Another factor preventing women from continuing their treatment, Kibutu said, was that many came from remote, rural areas and could not afford the bus fare to the district hospital for follow-up.

Ultimately, PSI's Wambugu said, all women needed to hear the message of PMTCT if they were to understand its importance."

When I tell women that I found out I was HIV-positive at the antenatal clinic and went on to have an HIV-negative baby boy, they often say they didn't believe that a positive woman could have a healthy baby," she said. "We need an even bigger media campaign to let all of them know it is possible for them to have healthy children."

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]

TAC woman calls on UN for action rather empty promises

2006-09-14T15:10:00.000+07:00

June 1, By Sapa, Cape Argus

South Africa- South African woman has become the first person living with HIV to address the UN General Assembly, urging countries to action rather than "empty promises" in the global fight against Aids.

Speaking in the opening session of the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV and Aids (Ungass) yesterday, Nkhensani Mavasa, 27, made a special appeal to the governments of African countries, where women make up 77% of new infections.

"I call on African leaders sitting here to protect and promote the human rights of all people in vulnerable groups, particularly women and girls," said Mavasa, the deputy chairwoman of the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC). "We ask you do not fail us yet again."

Mavasa addressed the conference as a representative of the International Women's Health Organisation after the TAC had declined an invitation to be part of the formal South African delegation.

The TAC turned down the invitation after the government intially refused to allow them and the Aids Law Project to join the delegation.

The TAC's Sipho Mthathi was billed to speak yesterday, at a massive street protest to mark the 25th anniversary of the first Aids diagnoses. Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang also addressed a roundtable discussion at the UN.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to two-thirds of all people living with HIV. The UN meeting of 10 heads of state and government, as well as 80 cabinet ministers, aims to adopt a blueprint to reach the goal of "universal access" to Aids care and prevention by 2010.

Mavasa told the assembly: "Your big task now is making sure this ... is not a document of empty promises, not a mere restatement of principle, but a platform for target based action. I ask that as you deliberate over the next two days, you'll be guided by the pain and hope which sits in our hearts as people of the world."

General Assembly president Jan Eliasson said Mavasa had brought the reality of HIV/Aids into the hall: "If we multiply her face, multiply, multiply, multiply we might get a slight notion of what this all means."

Yesterday the Health Ministry commended Mavasa's address.

Spokesman Sibani Mngadi said Mavasa had highlighted the challenges of poverty and the work being done in South Africa to make HIV treatment available."

She acknowledged that efforts have been made in her home town in Limpopo, as well as in other parts of South Africa to make the HIV/Aids prevention, care and treatment programme available," said Mngadi.

He said that Mavasa had contradicted a statement by TAC chairman Zackie Achmat that the government had lied to the UN about its treatment programme."

The spirit of her statement ... was in contrast to an unbecoming behaviour of TAC chairman, Zackie Achmat, during the TAC march in Pretoria on Tuesday."

During the march Achmat said the government had lied that South Africa had the biggest treatment programme in the world. "

The truth is that we have the biggest need in the world and we are not meeting that need," Achmat said.

Meanwhile, Tshabalala-Msimang told a roundtable discussion that she was pleased that prevention was at the centre of discussions at the conference.

She urged Ungass to build from commitments made in 2001, the ministry said in a statement."

The 2001 declaration on HIV/Aids acknowledges prevention as the mainstay of the response and recognises that poverty, underdevelopment and illiteracy are among the contributing factors to the spread of HIV," Tshabalala-Msimang said.

She said some of the challenges faced in the prevention of HIV/Aids included sustainable financing of programmes, overcoming the stigma and discrimination and a shortage of health workers. Governments and civil society should be encouraged to work together to overcome these challenges, Tshabalala-Msimang said.

In a statement from her spokeswoman, Charity Bhengu, the minister specified five focus areas for the South African delegation during discussions.

One was: "The importance of prevention, and the need to use various strategies and not be limited to a medical model approach which focuses on ARVs only."

The other areas were:

Poverty and status of women in society.

Challenges presented by vertical interventions when the health system as a whole wais weak.

The importance of food security as well as nutritional supplementation.

The importance for countries to determine their own strategies linked to their own "peculiarities".

International civil society denounce UN meeting on AIDS as a failure

2006-09-14T14:27:00.000+07:00

(June 2, 2006)

NEW YORK- Civil society groups from around the world denounced the final UN Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, released after marathon negotiations during the UN High Level meeting on AIDS this week.

“Once more we are disappointed at the failure to demonstrate real political leadership in the fight against the pandemic” said The Most Revd Njongonkulu Ndungane, the Anglican Archbishop of Capetown. “Even at this late stage, we call on the world’s political leaders to rise up and meet the challenges that the pandemic presents and to set ambitious targets at a national level to guarantee universal access to treatment, care, support and prevention.

”UN Member States refused to commit to hard targets on funding, prevention, care and treatment. They rejected frank acknowledgement that some of the today’s fastest growing HIV epidemics are happening among injecting and other drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men. “The final outcome document is pathetically weak. It is remarkable at this stage in the global epidemic that governments can not set the much needed targets nor can they can name in the document the very people that are most vulnerable” said Sisonke Msimang of the African Civil Society Coalition.

“African governments have displayed a stunning degree of apathy, irresponsibility, and complete disrespect for any of the agreements they made in the last few months” said Leonard Okello, Head of HIV/AIDS for Action Aid International. “The negotiation processes was guided by trading political, economic and other interests of the big and powerful countries rather than the glaring facts and statistics of the global AIDS crisis, seventy percent of which is in Sub-Saharan Africa.”

African government delegations reneged on their promises in the 2006 Abuja Common position agreed to by African Heads of State. South Africa and Egypt, in particular, took a deliberate decision to oppose the setting of targets on prevention and treatment, despite the fact that both participated in the Abuja Summit that endorsed ambitious targets to be reached by 2010. “The continent that is most ravaged by AIDS has demonstrated a complete lack of leadership. It is a sad, sad day as an African to be represented by such poor leadership” said Omololu Faloubi of the African Civil Society Coalition.

But the African governments were not alone. The United States was particularly damaging to the prospects for a strong declaration. Throughout the negotiations they moved time and again to weaken language on HIV prevention, low-cost drugs and trade agreements and to eliminate commitments on targets for funding and treatment. “It’s death by diplomacy,” said Eric Sawyer, veteran activist and 25-year survivor of HIV/AIDS. “Hour after hour, my government fought for its own selfish interests rather than for the lives of millions dying needlessly around the globe”

There has however been a strong recognition in the declaration of the alarming feminization of the pandemic. Commitments were made to ensure that women can exercise their right to have control over their sexuality and to the goal of achieving universal access to reproductive health by 2015.

This progress was undermined however by regressive governments. “Syria, Egypt, Yemen, Iraq, Pakistan and Gabon blocked efforts to recognize and act to empower girls to protect themselves from HIV infection” said Pinar Ilkkaracan, President of Women for Women’s Human Rights. “Their failure to commit to ensuring access to comprehensive sexuality education for young people, and promote and protect sexual rights will undermine the response to the HIV pandemic.”

This was compounded by the declaration failing to acknowledge that some of the today’s fastest growing HIV epidemics are happening among injecting and other drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men, despite strong support from the Rio Group of countries. For example, governments have ignored the needs of injecting drug users by not stating the need for substitution drug treatment, putting them at further risk. “Failing to fully address the needs of these groups, and particularly to counter stigma and discrimination by decriminalizing drug use and sexual behaviors, will render them more invisible and ultimately lead to even higher rates of HIV/AIDS” said Raminta Stuikyte of the Central and Eastern European Harm Reduction Network.

Again the US, along with other governments, ensured that the final declaration text contains a substantially weaker reference to the AIDS funding need. It now only acknowledges that more money is needed, rather than committing to raising the needed funds. An estimated $23 billion is needed per annum by 2010 in order to fund AIDS treatment, care, prevention and health infrastructure. “At this stage in the pandemic, we expected government commitment to close the global funding gap,” said Kieran Daly of the International Council of AIDS Service Organizations. “Instead they have tried to let themselves off the hook.”

While there has been a failure of governments to face the realities of HIV/AIDS, civil society will be holding them to account. Civil society will hold governments to account to deliver on universal access. Civil society will make sure governments recognize and support vulnerable populations. The failure of governments to commit will not be accepted.

EDITORS NOTE: “Vulnerable populations” includes women and girls, youth, older people, men who have sex with men, injecting and other drug users, sex workers, transgenders, people living in poverty, prisoners, migrant laborers, orphans, people in conflict and post-conflict situations, indigenous peoples, refugees and internally displaced persons, as well as HIV/AIDS outreach workers and people living with HIV/AIDS.

Supporting organizations:
AAHUNG
ACT UP NY
Action Aid International
Advocates for Youth
AfriCASO
African Committee Services
AIDS Access Foundation
Aids Fonds
AIDS Foundation East-West
AIDS Law ProjectAIDS Task Force,
Africa Japan Forum
Asia Pacific Council of AIDS Service Organizations (APCASO)
Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations (AFAO)
Blue Diamond Society
CALCSICOVA (Cordinadora de Asociacia Ves de Lucha Contra el SIDA de la Cournida Valenciana Catolicas por el Derecho a Decidir (Brasil)
Center for AIDS Rights, Thailand Center for Health and Gender Equity Central and Eastern European Harm Reduction Network (CEEHRN)
CESIDA - Coodinadora Espanalu en Sida Colectivo Juvenil Decide/ Bolivia European AIDS Treatment Group
GAT-Grupo Portugues de Activistas Sobre Tratamentos de VIH/SIDA
Gender AIDS Forum
Global AIDS Alliance
Global Youth Coalition on HIV/AIDS
Eastern Africa Region Global Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (GNP+)
Health & Development Networks
Health GAP (Global Access Project)
HelpAge
International HIV Association
Netherlands Housing Works, Inc
ICW Latina International Council of AIDS Service Organisations
International HIV/AIDS Alliance
International Women's AIDS Caucus & FEIM
International Working Group in Social Policies and Sexuality
International Parenthood Planning Federation (IPPF)
Journalists Against AIDS (JAAIDS/Nigeria)
Namibia Network of AIDS Service Organizsations (NANASO)
National AIDS Trust (UK)
National Association of PLWHA in Namibia (Lironga Eparu)
National Empowerment
Network of PLWHA in Kenya
Nepal HIV/AIDS Alliance
New Ways
NNIWA OSISA Positive Action Movement,
Nigeria Positive Women's Network
Red Latinoamericana y Caribena de Jevenes pro la Derecliora Sexuales y Reproduction (REDLAC)
Red Tra SexRED2002 (Spain)
RSMALC
Rutgers Nisso Group, The Netherlands
Sensoa V2WSEICUSShare - NetStop Aids Liberia
Student Global AIDS CampaignTenemos Sida (Spain)
Treatment Action Group (TAG)
Treatment Action Movement, Nigeria
UK Coalition of People Living with HIV and aids
Unitarian Universalist
United Nations Office
United Nations Association in Canada
VSO Women for Women's Human Rights (WWHR)
World AIDS Campaign
World Population Foundation, Netherlands

Rage Against the Machine: Anti-Politics and the AIDS Epidemic

2006-09-14T13:45:00.000+07:00

By Gregg Gonsalves, Gay Men's Health Crisis, April 22, 2006

By political I mean having to do with power: whose got it, who wants it, how it operates; in a word, whose allowed to do what to whom, who gets what from whom, who gets away with it and how
.…..Margaret Atwood's Second Words

We're so busy putting out fires right now, that we don't have the time to talk to each other and strategize and plan for the next wave, and the next day, and next month and the next week and the next year. And, we're going to have to find the time to do that in the next few months. And, we have to commit ourselves to doing that. And then, after we kick the shit out of this disease, we're all going to be alive to kick the shit out of this system, so that this never happens again.…..Vito Russo, Why We Fight

********************

I told a few friends the other day that I was worried that I was turning into a shrieking harpy. There is no doubt that I have been horribly angry for the past 15 years. I have watched the AIDS epidemic flourish, mow down friends, family and colleagues and despite the vast sums of money and hives of activity devoted to combating the disease, new infections erupt in the millions and millions more die horrible, painful deaths each year.

I do blame my government, other governments, drug companies, conservative religious institutions, and a rogue gallery of other villains, but, lately, I can’t help but think of my own role, our community’s role in perpetuating the epidemic.

I’ve written about this phenomenon twice now, once in a piece for the International AIDS Conference in Bangkok, called ‘How to Lose the War on AIDS’ and then again for a meeting convened by the Lawyers Collective in Mumbai last year, in a paper called ‘It Ain’t What You Do, but the Way That You Do It: Ten Points on International AIDS Treatment Activism.

’I am still stuck thinking about this, largely because despite my attempts to provoke a conversation about how we do this work, nothing seems to change very much in our modus operandi. The AIDS epidemic has everything, in Margaret Atwood’s words, to do with power: who’s got it, who wants it, how it operates; in a word, whose allowed to do what to whom, who gets what from whom, who gets away with it and how.

We knew this once, the rallying cry of ACT UP was that AIDS is a political crisis; we know this is still true particularly in places where the fight is conceived as an essentially political one: by South Africa’s Treatment Action Campaign, by Russia’s Front AIDS, by Thailand’s Thai Drug User Network, by Costa Rica’s Agua Buena Human Rights Association.

Don’t get me wrong, I do believe that AIDS is recognized as a political crisis by many, many people. Think of the dozens of sign-on letters we write and circulate, the meetings we attend to pound on the table, the reports, the press releases we put out demanding this, demanding that.

However, I have the sickening feeling that there has been a tremendous domestication of our political resistance--we trade on the legacy of our activist past or the reputation of our fiercest living champions, but as a movement, we have become a paper tiger.

Let’s take the upcoming United Nations General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS in New York in May 2006 where governments will come to boldly lie about their records in fighting AIDS and make hundreds of new, empty promises. UNAIDS has staged a series of consultations leading up to this gathering to develop a framework to achieve universal access to HIV prevention, care and treatment by 2010.

Activists were hand-picked by UNAIDS to attend most of these consultations, where UN and government officials listened to the needs of people living with HIV/AIDS, of sex workers, drug users, women, men-who-have-sex with men and other vulnerable populations, wrote them up in reports and issued the findings in glossy newsletters put together just for the occasion.

The UNGASS meeting will culminate in yet another political declaration on HIV/AIDS, based in part on these consultations and more centrally on negotiations with the governments that compose the UN’s membership on what they can agree to support. Tremendous amounts of energy, money and time have been invested in these processes over the past six months.

I was part of the Global Steering Committee on Universal Access and attended three meetings and helped to develop pages and pages of input for UNAIDS, hundreds of my colleagues are now busy finalizing shadow reports, deciding who will go to New York City in May, who will be selected to speak at the UN, organizing satellite events to highlight important issues.

Will anyone listen to us? Does anyone care what we have to say? Has anyone asked why the hell we’re devoting millions of dollars and hours to this process, when the previous UNGASS in 2001 resulted in a Declaration of Commitment, which was honored neither in word nor deed? What are the opportunity costs for activists that are now hip deep in this bullshit? What work hasn’t been done or could have been done with this time, this money?

The UN system is a system made for and by governments. Why are we engaging with a system in which we are not represented and is beholden not to us but to its member states? Yes, the international community must do more about HIV. But the international community doesn’t exist as an institution, there are countries and countries have leaders.

Imagine if all these resources expended by the community alone for this May meeting in New York City had been devoted to national campaigns demanding that governments honor what they promised 5 years ago? Or towards building real infrastructures for national, regional and international advocacy on HIV/AIDS? Or training each other on how to push for political change?

I can hear Zackie Achmat’s voice in my head calling me an ultra-leftist for refusing to deal with institutions to affect change. Well, Zackie and TAC engage with their government on a daily basis and have created a national infrastructure to press for political change. I am not suggesting that there is no use in the UNGASS meeting in May, particularly when it is part of a comprehensive political response to the AIDS crisis.

However, for many people, the UNGASS meeting in May has a role that is isolated from any other kind of political activity and has taken on a significance that it doesn’t deserve. For me, the frenzy around the UNGASS meeting represents an anti-political moment. The UNGASS’s role, its real contribution, to paraphrase Arundhati Roy, is to defuse political anger and blunt the edges of political resistance.

How did we get here? Well, not to over-simplify, but I think that we’ve seen an NGO-ization of HIV/AIDS that has weakened or destroyed our ability to build asocial movement to fight for our right to health, to be free of discrimination and violence, to the other services we need to stay alive and free from HIV infection.

We’ve also seen people living with HIV/AIDS, sex workers, women, men-who-have-sex-with-men, ethnic minorities, young people, drug users who are also working in the field become essential monsters: that is they think and act as if the greater involvement of people with AIDS (GIPA) or their vulnerable group has a value in and of itself, as if they have some special purchase on knowledge or rights simply because of who they are instead of linking those rights to a responsibility to engage politically in a feminist, anti-racist, anti-homophobic, pro-sex, pro-harm reduction, and pro-poor struggle that links us in solidarity, in commonality with each other, with millions of other people for whom other struggles perhaps matter more than our own.

What would I love to see? Well, it would be great if we could have the chat that Vito Russo asked for in 1988. I’d like us to ask if the institutions and organizations we’ve built up are really working towards achieving political change or are actually stymieing it.

How accountable are our NGOs to people living with HIV/AIDS and communities affected by the epidemic at the district level, the province, the country, the region, the planet? Are we creating institutions that seek to justify their own existence, their own organizational survival and expansion at the expense of challenging the powers-that-be: governments, UN agencies, drug companies, etc? Who is setting the agendas for our work? Are these agendas in the service of achieving specific, local political accountability or are they making calls for a more diffuse, generalized, international responsibility?

Are we becoming carpet baggers, itinerant technocrats, damn missionaries, toting our expertise around the globe trying to help people in other countries to solve their own problems or are we trying to promote local solutions to local problems by local people? Are we just talking about change, rather than mobilizing for it, trying to make it happen?

Are we just managing change, trying to turn resistance into a well-mannered, reasonable, salaried, 9-to-5 job, channeling the struggle into a three-day media event in New York City in May, a weeklong international AIDS conference in Toronto in August, and endless series of meetings, reports, conference calls and email exchanges?

I also want to stop talking about GIPA-the greater involvement of people living with HIV/AIDS. I am sick of GIPA and will not promote it any longer. Roy Cohn, the vicious, nasty, conservative asshole had AIDS and he was gay to boot. Roy Cohn sent Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to the electric chair and sat at the right hand of Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s when he persecuted hundreds of decent Americans for communist sympathies, whether or not they had then or ever been members of the Communist Party. He was not part of my community.

Do women want to claim Margaret Thatcher as one of their own? Do gay men want to claim Ernst Rohm, commander of the Nazi storm troopers as a fellow fag? Do Africans want to claim Idi Amin or Hendrik Verwoerd among their kin? If your own sense of your history or politics is based on biology, serostatus, country of origin, gender, sexuality, well, get ready to get in bed with all of the folks mentioned above.

This kind of identity politics excuses everything and accepts no political responsibility. It’s time we start asking each other: what are you doing to promote the reproductive and sexual rights of women; to fight rape and violence against women; to promote access to HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment, to education, to safe and affordable housing and other basic services regardless of gender, sexuality, ethnic origin, regardless of ability to pay?

What are you doing to legalize methadone, buprenorphine, syringe exchange and reform drug and narcotics regulation, protect sex workers from harassment, ensure they have working conditions that don’t endanger their health or well-being? What are you doing to ensure that young people get comprehensive information about sexuality, STIs and HIV/AIDS?

Let’s base our personal commitment to the fight against HIV/AIDS not on who we are, but what we do for others and not just for those who are like us, but those who are different in whichever way each of us chooses to categorize it. If we hold our organizations accountable, we have to hold ourselves accountable too. So, I am one pissed off sister.

I am angry at the epidemic, but angry about a machine we’ve created that drains the politics out what is happening around us, that, in fact, fosters both an institutional and personal anti-politics that fuels the fires of HIV/AIDS. I don’t know when we’ll all get the chance to talk, but we need to have a conversation about where we’re going and how we’re going to get there.

Otherwise, we’ll see each other at the next UNGASS in another 5 years time and realize we’ve been driving around in circles all this time, never recognizing we’ve seen this all before, our journey hasn’t even started and the car is, sadly, out of gas.

Source: ITPC eForum

Myanmar Shadow Report for the 2006 High Level Meeting on AIDS

2006-09-14T11:38:00.000+07:00

Compiles by the Concerned Civil Society Observers (Anon), 1 May 2006

The Union of Myanmar joined all member states of the United Nations in making a Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS at the UN General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS five years ago.

In this 2001 Declaration, member states of the UN promised that they would meet time-bound and measurable goals on HIV prevention and care. Later this month there will be a High Level Meeting on AIDS, also called the UNGASS review, to report on progress over five years. It will be held from 31 May to 2 June at the United Nations in New York.

The UN Joint Programme on HIV/AIDS has stated that it is committed to ensuring the meeting is fully informed and comprehensive. Each member state has been asked by the Secretary General of the UN to prepare a report before the meeting. The UN asked that country reports be developed in collaboration with groups representing civil society.

The Government of the Union of Myanmar did not do this. A draft of the country report indicators was made available to a few UN and nongovernmental stakeholders at a meeting in Yangon in March. It is unknown whether the comments of these organisations were taken into consideration in drafting of the final country report.

The Community Partnership division of the UNAIDS secretariat in Geneva committed itself to publish the submitted national progress reports on its website by the end of April. One hundred and twenty six country reports are posted but Myanmar's report is not one of them.

It is now less than a month before the High Level Meeting. Information to prepare this shadow report had to be obtained from unofficial sources inside the country. Had the official national report been submitted on time and posted, the preparation of this shadow report could have been a transparent, accountable, and effective process.

There are four important issues in the official Myanmar country report that are noted by this shadow report:

1) governmental spending does not demonstrate governmental commitment to an adequate response to the epidemic
2) there is no official strategy for HIV in the armed forces
3) a large proportion of men admit to extramarital sexual relationships
4) exaggerated claims about high quality of care of sexually transmitted infections cast doubt on the reliability of other data

1) inadequate governmental funding
Due to differences in official and unofficial exchange rates, it is difficult to accurately determine official governmental spending for any reason in Myanmar. The government reported 22 million kyat annual spending on HIV/AIDS in an application to the Global Fund against AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria several years ago.

That figure was widely interpreted as representing a real annual expenditure of about 20 thousand dollars. In the Myanmar country report for the High Level Meeting this year the amount reported is 78 million kyat. Using a rough exchange rate of one thousand kyat to the dollar, this represents almost a four fold increase of spending to about 80 thousand dollars.

Few countries have increased spending four fold over the last few years (Russia's spending has gone up twenty fold) so Myanmar deserves congratulations for increasing spending. But the overall amount is too low. Myanmar officially recognises HIV as a priority health issue. Spending one and a half cents per capita on HIV does not demonstrate that it is committed to tackling the problem.

2) lack of a strategy for the armed forces
The Myanmar country report discloses that the country does not have a strategy to address HIV/AIDS issues among its national armed forces. In most countries lack of a strategic plan for the military would not be a big issue. Not so in Myanmar.

The International Crisis Group estimates that there are at least 400,000 armed lower ranks within the armed forces, representing approximately 3 per cent of the adult male population. Armed men in the ethnic forces are estimated to be at least 70,000. Military spending accounts for a large proportion of the central budget.

The armed forces are spread all over the country but are concentrated in areas of unrest or former rebel activity. Not surprisingly, these areas also have a high prevalence of HIV. Men in the military often serve away from their wives and family. Unprotected sex is common in this situation.

Since there is no HIV strategy for the armed forces, observers of the HIV epidemic in the country are not surprised to hear reports of summary dismissal of soldiers found to have HIV and lack of care for infected soldiers and their families. The governmental forces are not the only ones to suffer from lack of an official HIV strategy: rebel ethnic armies also have no HIV plans. They are not included in the governmental country report to the United Nations.

3) sexual behaviour of men
Official reports from Myanmar governmental sources rarely mention sexual behaviour, so it was with a measure of surprise that the official country report documents were found to have new data on men's sexual behaviour.

No one doubts that most Burman women who are not sex workers have just one sexual partner – their husband. But information about the sexual behaviour of men is rarely reported. The new report says that 28.2% of men admit they had sex with someone who were not their wives in the last twelve months. This data was obtained from official sentinel surveillance activities undertaken by the state National AIDS Programme.

The government of the Union of Myanmar deserves praise for it openness in making public this data on men's sexual behaviour.

This figure certainly means the mystery of Myanmar men's sexual behaviour is over. A significant number of men admit that they bought sex in the last year. It is this large number of men having unprotected sex with a smaller number of women who sell sex that drives the epidemic. The prevention goals are clear – partner reduction and increased condom use.

4) quality of care for sexually transmitted infections
The report states that forty thousand men with venereal diseases last year were observed at health care facilities to be appropriately diagnosed, treated and counselled. This is simply untrue. The government does not have the personnel to monitor the quality of care for all these men reporting to doctors with symptoms of sexually transmitted infections.

The last time that a sample of doctors was observed in a study to see how they provided care to a hundred and fifty men with sexually transmitted infections was almost ten years ago. Only 15% of the care observed at that time was adequate. It is impossible that the quality of care has improved to 100% accuracy in a few years and staggering to think that a governmental agency would report that forty thousand doctor-patient interactions were observed by researchers.

The inaccuracy of this data throws doubt on other data in the report. If the Ministry of Health cannot be trusted to publish reliable data on the care provided by health care staff can we believe the Ministry when it reports that that one in five young people knows how to prevent HIV infection?

Outgoing United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has stated: "While certain countries have reached key targets and milestones for 2005 as set out in the Declaration, many countries have failed to fulfil the pledges.

"It is up to all of us in civil society to determine whether Myanmar has fulfilled its pledge made five years ago. And whether the state is fully committed to increasing effective action against the epidemic. We think it is not.

Concerned Civil Society Observers

Advocacy Guide: Meaningful Involvement of Civil Society in the UNGASS Review Meeting

2006-09-14T11:21:00.000+07:00

HDN & ICASO

Five years ago, under the heading of ‘Global Crisis- Global Action’, the United Nations General Assembly held an unprecedented special session on HIV/AIDS (UNGASS) – the first time the General Assembly ever addressed a specific health issue.

The resulting UNGASS Declaration of Commitment (DoC) on HIV/AIDS adopted by all UN Member States provided a comprehensive framework to halt and to reverse the HIV/AIDS epidemic by 2010, and included specific and measurable milestones for 2003, 2005 and 2010.

Five years after its adoption, governments are being called to report on progress they have made toward implementing these promises. One of their commitments is to: “..devote sufficient time and at least one full day of the annual session of the General Assembly to review and debate a report of the Secretary-General on progress achieved in realizing the commitments set out in the Declaration.

”Between May 31st and June 2nd, 2006, every member country of the United Nations will be sending a delegation to New York to participate in this review meeting. The International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) and Health & Development Networks (HDN) have partnered to prepare this guide to assist you to advocate to be part of your national delegation, to support and to influence them.

It also describes other ways in which you can participate in the UNGASS Review process. This guide will be available in French and Spanish March 31st, 2006.

To download copies please visit: www.icaso.org or www.ungasshiv.org Or write to ungass@icaso.org

Action: Consultation on the civil society participation in the HIV/AIDS UNGASS DoC processes ICASO

2006-09-14T10:47:00.000+07:00

From ICASO (International Council of AIDS Service Organisations)

OPPORTUNITY FOR INPUT: CONSULTATION ON THE PARTICIPATION OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN THE PROCESSES RELATED TO THE HIV/AIDS UNGASS DECLARATION OF COMMITMENT [DoC] AT COUNTRY LEVEL

Dear friends/colleagues:

The International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) is undertaking a project entitled:

'STORIES FROM THE FRONTLINES: LESSONS LEARNT IN THE INVOLVEMENT OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN THE MONITORING AND REPORTING PROCESS ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE UNGASS DECLARATION OF COMMITMENT'.

Almost five years ago, under the heading of 'Global Crisis- Global Action', the United Nations General Assembly held an unprecedented special session on HIV/AIDS (UNGASS) - the first time the General Assembly ever addressed a specific health issue. The resulting UNGASS Declaration of Commitment (DoC) signed by all UN Member States provided a comprehensive framework to halt and to reverse the HIV/AIDS epidemic by 2010, and included specific and measurable milestones for 2003, 2005 and 2010.

Five years after its adoption, governments are being called to report on progress they have made toward implementing these promises. Paragraph 94 of the DoC calls for civil society involvement in the national periodic reviews of the progress achieved in realizing these commitments, to identify problems and obstacles to achieving progress, and to ensure wide dissemination of the results of these reviews. This project aims to compile information on how civil society organizations (CSOs) have participated in the UNGASS DoC-related reporting processes at country level.

The output of this consultation will be a report highlighting lessons learnt on how CSOs have monitored and reported on the implementation of the DoC. The consultation will look at the involvement (or not) of CSOs in the preparation and discussion of the national official (government-led) report, and the participation of CSOs in civil society-led monitoring and reporting initiatives. Your stories will inspire and interest others to mobilize and advocate for more civil society involvement in the response to HIV. The aim is that we all share, learn from and replicate the positive processes and experiences in other countries in the coming years.

The Stories from the Frontlines will highlight best practices, success stories, as well as barriers, challenges and opportunities faced in participating in the UNGASS reporting process. It will include stories from civil society actors and organizations from all regions of the world in order to capture differences in national experiences. Stories will be collected through an electronic consultation in 4 languages (English, French, Spanish and Russian). Civil society organizations worldwide are invited to send us their experiences. These could be success stories or challenges.Please send your responses before April 7, 2006 to ungass@icaso.org

Below are some questions to help guide you in your responses. There are two scenarios for this consultation.

The first one deals with the involvement of civil society in the government-led reporting process.

The second scenario deals with civil society monitoring and reporting 'outside' the government-led process (shadow reports). If you participated in both scenarios, please complete both parts.

There is a third part with overall general questions, which apply to both scenarios. You do not need to answer the questions in order. Although these questions have been designed to guide your response, please feel free to add as much information as you want. Include your contact information (email and phone number) as well as your organization and country. Please also indicate if you authorize ICASO to use/publish your name and your organizational affiliation.

Depending on the number of words submitted, ICASO will edit your contribution, but you will have a chance to review it befor e it gets published. We thank you in advance for your participation.

PART A: SCENARIO 1: Involvement in government-led reporting process.

Were you (individually or your organization) involved in any way with the official (government-led) UNGASS reporting process in 2005? If yes, please provide detailed information about your experience. Please include answers to:
a) Were you contacted/invited by the government authority or did you have to contact them/take the initiative?
b) What was the process used by the government to collect the data and was it inclusive of civil society input?
c) Did the UNAIDS country office (or UN-theme group) play a role? Explain
d) Did the methodology to collect data/seek input included meetings of stakeholders? Who was invited/included? How many meetings were organized?
e) Who was responsible for writing the report?
f) How was the consultation process carried out once the report was drafted? Were there consultations with stakeholders? Was there an opportunity to provide input?
g) Was the input provided by civil society taken into account in the final report submitted to UNAIDS? Did you get a copy of this report?

PART B: SCENARIO 2: Involvement in monitoring/reporting "outside" the government-led process.

Were you (individually or your organization) involved in any way in monitoring and reporting on the implementation of the DoC outside the government-led process? If yes, please provide detailed information about your experience. Please include answers to:

a) Was this involvement part of a larger/multi-country project?
b) Did the initiative produce a 'shadow' report? Is the report available? What format have you used to present the information? (cases studies, theme/topic based, etc)
c) How have you used the report?
d) What methodology/process was used to collect and validate the data/information? What data did you collect? Who was involved? Which sectors were included as 'key informants' or participants?
e) What role, if any, did the UNAIDS country office (or UN-theme group) play?
f) What was the reaction of the government (if any) to your initiative? Did any government official participate?
g) Did other NGOs/CBOs/CSOs participate in the process?
h) Was this report (or the information therein) in any way incorporated into the official government-led report?

PART C:

1) What are some of the barriers/challenges that you faced in any or both of the above scenarios? How did you overcome them?
2) What are your recommendations for:a. More involvement of civil society in monitoring/reporting initiatives b. More effective civil society-led monitoring/reporting initiatives
3) What are your major lessons learnt/recommendations for CSOs that would like to get involved in these monitoring/reporting processes in the years to come?

We look forward to hearing your story.

Thank you, in anticipation, for your cooperation.

[Note: Members can find this announcement in French, Spanish, and Russian on the ICASO website at: http://www.icaso.org]

Source: PartnersZimbabwe eForum

Selection of Civil Society Participants to the UNGASS Review Meeting (Update) Civil Society Partnerships

2006-09-14T10:30:00.000+07:00

23 February 2006

Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS Review Selection of Civil Society Participants

UpdateIn 2005 the United Nations General Assembly agreed to convene a High-Level Meeting and undertake a Comprehensive Review of the progress achieved in realizing the targets set out in the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS from May 31 to June 2, 2006 (Resolution A/RES/60/224).

To ensure the Review draws on the expertise of all key sectors engaged in the AIDS response the Resolution called for the Office of the General Assembly President to draw up a list of civil society participants (to join those already accredited through ECOSOC) for consideration by Member States by 15 February 2006.

The Office of the General Assembly President asked UNAIDS Secretariat to receive applications. UNAIDS published information and an application form on its website and received applications for possible participants up until an agreed deadline of 3 February. That process is now closed and late applications are not being accepted.

On 15 February the Office of the General Assembly President forwarded completed applications from this process to Member States for their consideration on a "no-objection basis" as described in the Resolution A/RES/60/224. A small percentage of organizations applying did not provide complete information and so their details could not be forwarded to Member States for their consideration.

Member States are now reviewing the list and have the right to object to suggestions that were put forward for consideration by 3 March 2006.

The General Assembly President will then formally present a list of organizations to the Assembly for decision. As soon as possible thereafter the list of organizations that has been agreed for accreditation will be published.

It is important to note that civil society organizations cleared for accreditation to attend the Review Meeting will not be guaranteed any financial support however UNAIDS will endeavor to secure support for some organizations to attend the Review and will publish details of that process on its website in March.

ECOSOC accredited organizations will be able to participate in the Review through a separate process. These organizations are being asked to confirm their interest in participating in the meeting by 30 March 2006 with the DESA Non-Governmental Organizations Section of the United Nations Secretariat.

In all cases civil society organizations are encouraged to approach their governments to be included in national delegations wherever possible.

Please direct any queries to: csp@unaids.org

Civil Society Information Note from UNAIDS

2006-09-14T10:07:00.000+07:00

26 January 2006, BTS EForum

Please find below, the UNAIDS Civil Society Information Note outlining four ways in which civil society can participate in the upcoming comprehensive review of progress towards the UNGASS Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS targets. The meeting will take place in New York from 31 May - 2 June 2006.

Please note that the deadline for civil society nominations/applications to be submitted to the UNAIDS is 3 February 2006. You can access the UNAIDS application form in English, French, Spanish and Russian at http://www.unaids.org/en/GetStarted/CivilSociety.asp on the UNAIDS website.

You can also access the letter of the President of the General Assembly (GA) referred to here in this posting at http://www.healthdev.org/eforums/cms/showMessage.asp?msgid=9705 on the forum archives.]

****************

Comprehensive Review of progress towards targets set out in the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS (31 May- 2 June 2006, New York)

Accreditation of Civil Society Participants

Further to the 13 January 2005 letter of the President of the General Assembly (GA) on civil society participation (1), this is to clarify that there are four ways for civil society organizations to be accredited to the 31 May-2 June Review:

1. Civil society organizations that are accredited to the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC) will be able to register and secure accreditation through the Non-Governmental Organizations Section of the United Nations Secretariat. ECOSOC accredited organizations are encouraged to confirm their interest in participating in the meeting by 30 March 2006 with the Non-Governmental Organizations Section of the United Nations Secretariat at desangosection@un.org providing information on the number of representatives expected to attend the meeting. Registration will permit attendance at the meetings, and facilitate consideration for participation in the round tables of the meeting.

2. Member States and Observers have also been invited to include civil society and private sector representatives in their national delegations to the meeting. Non-ECOSOC accredited civil society representatives are encouraged to negotiate participation as part of a country delegation.

3. NGO members of the UNAIDS Programme Coordinating Board may participate in accordance with operational paragraph 7 of GA Resolution A/RES/60/224.

4. To facilitate further attendance by civil society organizations, the Office of the GA President will draw up a list of additional civil society organizations to be invited. UNAIDS is currently receiving nominations for consideration by the Office of the GA President. The deadline for nominations is 3 February 2006. Only organizations who have sent in a nomination form and who are not in any of the above categories will qualify for consideration. Nomination forms are available form the UNAIDS website www.unaids.org or by emailing UNAIDS at csp@unaids.org.

After the closing date all nomination forms will be reviewed to check that they are from bona fide organizations working on AIDS by a panel that includes NGO representatives to the UNAIDS Programme Coordinating Board. A tentative list of civil society organizations will then be forwarded to the Office of the President of the GA for his consideration. The GA President, after appropriate consultations with Member States, will circulate the list for consideration by the GA on a non-objection basis not later than 15 February 2006.

Further information: csp@unaids.org

Source: Break-the-silence eForum

UNGASS 2006: GA Draft Resolution Approved on Implementation of the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS

2006-09-14T09:58:00.000+07:00

New York, 28 December 2005 -- In 2001, the General Assembly held a special session on HIV/AIDS which led to the adoption of a resolution entitled "Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS.

This resolution outlined a number of commitments in the areas of leadership; prevention; care, support and treatment; human rights;reduction of vulnerability; children orphaned or affected by HIV/AIDS;alleviation of social and economic impacts; research and development; resources; and follow-up.

The World Summit Outcome Document reaffirmed full implementation of this Declaration and following several informal consultations earlier this month led by Ambassador Hackett of Barbados and Ambassador Laohaphan of Thailand the GA adopted a new resolution on 23 December 2005 that "decides to undertake a comprehensive review of the progress achieved" in reaching the Declaration's targets.

This review session will be held from 31 Mayto 1 June of 2006 and will be followed by a high-level meeting on 2 June 2006,which aims to maintain engagement of world leaders in the global response to HIV/AIDS.

The review will take place in the form of plenary sessions, panel discussions, roundtables and a hearing with civil society. Civil society members will also be invited to participate in the roundtable discussions and the resolution encourages member states to include in their delegations representatives of civil society from their respective countries from various sectors, including people living with HIV/AIDS.

The Secretary-General will be responsible for preparing a comprehensive report prior to the review on progress achieved and remaining challenges.Click here to download the adopted resolution submitted by the President of the General Assembly on preparations for and organization of the 2006 follow-up meeting on the outcome of the twenty-sixth special session: implementation of the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS.

http://www.reformtheun.org/index.php/united_nations/1884

source: Health Gap List