01 December 2006

Without urgent action, world leaders will fail to fulfil their promise of delivering universal access to HIV & AIDS treatment, prevention and care by 2010, according to the anti-poverty agency ActionAid.

Every day 8,000 people die of AIDS yet the funding gap is still $10 billion a year and only 20% of people living with the virus are receiving treatment. 

"Rich countries are in danger of making a mockery of their own commitment to this fight", said Aditi Sharma, Head of the HIV & AIDS team at ActionAid.

"We cannot allow leaders to abandon the fight against AIDS as if it were some passing fashion."  

Africa continues to bear the brunt of the epidemic with 72% of global deaths caused by the virus, according to the latest 2006 UNAIDS report on the Global AIDS Epidemic.

Across Asia, only one in six people are receiving treatment while in India treatment remains at below 10% of need.

"More than a year after world leaders committed to universal access there is still no funding plan to finance this goal," said Sharma. 

Evidence shows that the response should focus on the rights of the most vulnerable groups - sex workers, men who have sex with men and injecting drug users, to reverse the spread of AIDS, but governments are studiously avoiding them.

Young people between the ages of 15-24 years now account for 40% of the 4.3 million new infections and two thirds of these are young women.

But worldwide, only 20% of all young women understand how to prevent transmission.

"We must not allow prejudice and ignorance to diminish HIV & AIDS prevention efforts.

"Governments must allocate significant funds to back rhetoric on promoting women's rights and the cost of treatment must be cut. And preventative healthcare needs to be accessible to halt the needless death of millions of people," said Sharma.

"While there is now some recognition that the fight against AIDS will not be won unless gender inequality and violence against women and girls are targeted, there is no government or donor around the world committing adequate funds or implementing programmes needed to advance the sexual and reproductive rights of women and reduce their vulnerability," she said.