United Nations Launches AIDS War Chest
By Phil Dobson
July 23, 2001
On Friday the United Nations launched an AIDS war chest which fell far short of their target of $10 billion. U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, who was attending the G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, said the industrialized nations had promised more then $1.2 billion to date. "For the first time, we are seeing the emergence of a response to this deadly disease that begins to match the scale of the epidemic itself," Annan said, adding that, "The battle against AIDS will not be won without the necessary resources. We need to mobilize an additional $7-10 billion a year to fight the disease."
In the 22 years since the discovery of AIDS, 23 million people have died, the HIV virus infects 36 million, and 10 million children have been orphaned. Everyday about 14,000 people, the majority living in Africa, Asia and Central and South America are infected with HIV.
In a statement from the Global AIDS Alliance said it was deeply disappointed and criticized President Bush for failing to show commitment. "The pledges to the fund proposed at Genoa are still outrageously low," Alliance spokesman David Bryden said. "And while Bush talks of AIDS as an emergency, initiatives in Congress to massively increase funding to fight AIDS are languishing for lack of support from the White House."
The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, based in New York, said no more than about $470 million was currently being invested globally in AIDS vaccine research.
Spokesperson for the humanitarian medical agency Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF), Access to Medicines campaign, Ellen 't Hoen said, "We are here at the G8 summit to demand that the governments of the richest countries of the world put people's lives over profits of the U.S. and Europe-based industry."
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