BANGKOK (AlertNet) - Economic crisis and climate
change concerns could affect the fight against the AIDS virus and lead to a "universal nightmare", said the head of the United
Nations' agency for HIV/AIDS.
The global economic downturn has brought about greater inequality and could increase vulnerability and fuel the epidemic, said Michele Sidibe, executive director of UNAIDS.
About 33.4 million people worldwide are infected with HIV and the AIDS virus. Since AIDS emerged in the 1980s, almost 60 million people have been infected and 25 million have died.
"This is no time to stop. If we stop helping those people, the majority of whom are coming from the poorest segment of society, what we will face is a universal nightmare," he said in
an interview on Sunday.
Sidibe was attending a meeting in Bangkok of
parliamentarians from 150 countries to press for the lifting of travel restrictions on people infected with HIV, which he said
were "outdated", "obsolete" and a "violation of basic human rights."
More than a quarter of the world's countries, territories and areas still deny HIV-positive people entry, stay or residence because of their status, UNAIDS said, including first world countries such as Australia and Singapore.
MAINTAIN FUNDING
Sidibe urged governments facing budgetary restraints not to reduce funding for HIV treatment and prevention.
"The world has enough wealth. In 2008, we had 1.5 trillion (U.S. dollars) spent on military expenditure," Sidibe said. Â?This is madness, from my point of view, that we don't have 5 billion to help those 10 million people who are waiting for treatment, knowing that their life is hanging in the balance."
Sidibe countered criticism that the focus on HIV/AIDS had led to a neglect of other fatal diseases, saying that the agency was working to integrate programmes for both HIV and tuberculosis, which is a common cause of death in HIV patients.
In addition, HIV prevention should take on a holistic approach, he said. For example, educating young girls means protecting them and equipping them to negotiate their sexuality.
"When you have one woman every minute raped in parts of the world and when you protect such women, you're helping to ensure they will not be pregnant when they're 13 years old and they will not get HIV," he said.
"That will have an impact on HIV but it will also have an impact on maternal and child mortality."
NEW POPULATIONS INFECTED
Since HIV was discovered, significant progress has been made. New infections have fallen 17 percent in the past eight years and over four million people now receive necessary treatment.
A recent report by the Global Fund, a multi-donor initiative fighting HIV, malaria and tuberculosis, said the elimination of
mother-to-child transmission is within reach by 2015.
However, Sidibe said the virus was making inroads into new populations and areas. According to UNAIDS, for every two people put on treatment, five are newly infected.
He said Africa remains the worst affected but there is growing concern about other parts of the world.
"We are seeing a decline in new infections almost everywhere except in eastern Europe and Central Asia," Sidibe said.
Around 70 percent of new infections occurring in those regions were drug users with no access to services because they are considered criminals, he added.
In Africa, 40 percent of all new infections occur in people who are married or living in stable relationships.
"Three things are very important (in combating AIDS)," said Sidibe "They are prevention, prevention and prevention."
He said all possible tools, from condoms to circumcision, needed to be used and support from big pharmaceutical companies was essential.
"We need to renegotiate how we can have pharmaceutical firms engaged in a process which can help us to have more sample drugs and better quality first-line treatment," he said.
This will help patients live longer in the initial stage of treatment instead of being forced to move on to more powerful and much more expensive second and third-line treatments, Sidibe added.
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