HIV/AIDS

ONE and (RED) launch the (2015)QUILT: A digital quilt to fight AIDS

Dec 1st, 2011 9:59 AM UTC
By Garth Moore

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the discovery of HIV/AIDS. But this World AIDS Day –- December 1st — we’re commemorating it as a call to action to help bring about the beginning of the end of AIDS… and it starts with you.

We’re proud to announce the launch of the (2015)QUILT, a groundbreaking digital tool that brings people from all over the world together to fight for a historic achievement –- the delivery of the first AIDS-free generation in more than 30 years.

Watch our latest video and get started now:

It’s quick, easy, and fun to add your name to the digital quilt. And, you’re making a pledge with your panel, joining thousand of people from around the world who will call attention to fight for a bold plan to create an AIDS Free generation by 2015. Think of it as “creative advocacy.”

Once you’ve created your panel, you can download our Social Media Toolkit (or read it in the viewer below) and learn how you can help spread the word about your quilt panel. The toolkit will also link you to other resources that you’ll need to help in our campaign in the fight against AIDS.

The (2015)QUILT draws its inspiration from the internationally celebrated AIDS Memorial Quilt, which started in 1987 and contained more than 94,000 names and weighs 54 tons! The AIDS Memorial Quilt has been used to fight prejudice, to raise awareness and to transform apathy into advocacy and indifference into compassion. The (2015)QUILT will be a call to action to bring about the end of this deadly disease.

So get creative and get started now at 2015quilt.com and use your voice to pledge. Every generation is known for something. Let’s be the one to deliver an AIDS-Free Generation by 2015.

The Beginning of the End of AIDS

Nov 30th, 2011 8:17 PM UTC
By Dr Sipho Moyo

Is it possible that the success Africa has had, in managing and treating HIV/AIDS, reduced the sting of the HIV pandemic on the continent? The fact is, according to UNAIDS’ latest report, there are more people living with HIV today than there were 10 years ago. Approximately 34 million people live with HIV today, up 17% from 2001. In parallel, deaths from AIDS-related illnesses have decreased by 21%  since 2005

This is chiefly because there is better access to antiretroviral drugs in sub-Saharan Africa, where 68% of all HIV cases worldwide are found. Gone are the gory images synonymous with AIDS, that often appeared in the 1990s to early 2000s, which left many with the sound conviction that contracting the HIV virus was as good as pronouncing a death sentence.

Much credit goes to Africa’s people, its governments and our international partners for sustained efforts in the relentless fight against HIV in Africa. A good example of such leadership among others is the government of South Africa — they are now financing as much as 80% of the antiretroviral medication for its people through its own health budget, bolstered by technical support from donors. Botswana achieved universal access to treatment in 2008, and since then has begun to see a further decline in new infections. The percentage of children born HIV-positive to mothers living with HIV in Botswana also declined from 21% in 2003 to 4% in 2010 — impressive progress thanks in part to sustained political leadership.

Today, 22 countries in sub-Saharan Africa have reduced new HIV infections by more than 25%, data shows that an HIV-positive person on treatment is 96% less likely to pass HIV on to others and clinical trials have proven that voluntary male circumcision reduces the risk of new HIV infection in men by roughly 60%.

These numbers tell a great story, but there are other numbers that could put to risk the great progress made by African governments, development partners and the private sector. UNAIDS statistics show that the availability of funding to combat HIV is generally on the decline while funding needed to fight the pandemic is increasing. According to UNAIDS, at the end of 2010 around US$ 15 billion was available for the AIDS response in low- and middle-income countries. Yet donor funding has been reduced by 10% from US $7.6 billion in 2009 to US $6.9 billion in 2010, and the Global Fund recently had to cancel Round 11 of grant-making due to insufficient or delayed donor funds.

This begs the question: How do you put millions of people on treatment, give them renewed hope, and then back off, knowing full well the catastrophic implications of such action?

We still have nearly 9 million HIV positive people who are still in need of treatment, 1,000 babies born with HIV everyday, and nearly two new people are infected for every one person put on treatment. This reminds me of what remains an indelible statement by Dr. Kihumuro Apuuli, director general of the Uganda AIDS Commission who said, “You cannot mop the floor when the tap is still running on it.”

For all the commitment and investment our governments and development partners have made much remains to be done if we are to make this period in history become the beginning of the end of AIDS. So what does this mean? Well, at ONE, we believe that, it means reminding ourselves to recommit to measurable goals. They include:

• Virtually eliminating mother-to-child transmission by 2015
• Accelerating access to treatment for 15 million people by 2015
• Implement innovative prevention techniques to drastically reduce new infections by 2015.

These goals are by no means new. World leaders have already committed to them in various international forums. If these commitments — including commitments to the Global Fund — are renewed, together, we can really begin to see the end of this pandemic.

A wake-up call in the fight against AIDS

Nov 26th, 2011 12:01 AM UTC
By Adrian Lovett

An uneasy sensation, of the pit-of-the-stomach kind, spread among the activists and donors supporting the fight against AIDS this week. The Global Fund, the international partnership that channels money to fight AIDS, TB and malaria, announced it has been forced to delay applications for new programmes due to insufficient funding from donors. Instead it will have to focus its efforts on maintaining the current programmes. After a decade of huge leaps forward in the fight against AIDS, it is hugely concerning that progress may stall.

New figures from UNAIDS this week showed that in just one year we have added 1.4 million people to treatment. In 2003 only 100,000 people had access to life-saving antiretroviral treatment, now more than 6.6 million people do. This is in large part thanks to the work of the Global Fund which is responsible for a sizeable chunk of the global response to HIV and AIDS.

Despite this progress, nearly 8 million others are still waiting for life saving drugs and the number of new HIV infections remains high. And while effective treatment to prevent mothers passing on the virus to their babies is available, less than half of HIV positive women have access to it. A major push is still needed in order to turn the corner in this epidemic.

This year, for the first time, evidence shows us that it is possible to end AIDS within a generation. New research found that an HIV-positive individual on antiretroviral treatment is up to 96% less likely to transmit the virus to others. This news should give us reason to be more hopeful than ever that the fight against AIDS is one we can win. But this hope is being undermined by donors who are not meeting their promises to the Global Fund. In the past all pledges made to the donor fund have been delivered, but now this record is slipping. Some donors are not keeping their promises and others are delaying pledges. Now is the worst possible time for delays and broken promises.

There have been concerns about the Global Fund. It is true that the Fund identified a very small proportion of funds being lost. But the Fund has a zero tolerance policy for corruption. Suspected corruption is pursued aggressively, corrupt officials go to jail, steps are taken to reclaim funds and new safeguards are put in place. The Fund has also introduced a pro-active plan of action to address any remaining issues. The openness of the Global Fund and its commitment to deal with concerns head-on is something worth celebrating. And reforms agreed this week will make the Global Fund not just a life-saving global health institution but also a leading example of smart aid and transparency in practice. If donors had doubts, they should now have confidence.

Germany has responded to this development by releasing a commitment of $100m to support the Global Fund. Other donors now need to follow. And donors must commit to serious planning for an ambitious scale-up of efforts over the next couple of years, to ensure the Global Fund can reach many more people who need its help.  We cannot afford to lose ground just when the beginning of the end of AIDS is in sight.

When the Global Fund was first established Kofi Annan said “the war on AIDS will not be won without a war chest”. That is still true today. The world needs the Global Fund and we need to fund it. This would be the worst time to falter.

This article first appeared on the Huffington Post UK website.

This is not the moment to give up on aid, but to believe in it – Tony Blair

Nov 24th, 2011 10:24 AM UTC
By Claire Hazelgrove

Next week will be the first time in years we see former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair taking to the international stage and attending a high level forum with world leaders. The Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan, South Korea will review the progress made on former commitments to aid effectiveness, and showcase commitments that set a new agenda for development. Certainly one to watch.

Last week, ONE spoke to Tony Blair about his message to leaders as he prepares to attend the forum in Busan.  We also took the opportunity to talk to him about some of the issues we’ve been calling for change on at ONE, and about how his Africa Governance Initiative plays a part in this.

So, why is he attending the Busan conference on aid effectiveness, and how can it be made a success?

“I think the most important thing is to show people this is a developing debate around an area where, believe it or not, things can change. I mean I happen to think with Africa, I think Africa is a continent on the move.”

Blair believes it vital that we show the progress made in Africa, and give people “a sense of the potential,” as many African countries “have come a long way in the past decade partly as a result of imaginative development policy.” He also points to the momentum that he hopes will be seen at Busan with so many leaders attending, including Hillary Clinton.

He also levelled a challenge at them, sending his message ahead of the conference: “We’re about to enter a whole new decade of really exciting innovation and development in the aid space. And so this is not the moment to give up on it but to believe in it.”

With 10 years of experience of international summits as UK Prime Minister, we asked how, following on from the recent meeting of world leaders in Cannes, the G20 should follow through on their warm words and break the cycle of famine by delivering long-term agricultural solutions , and how we at ONE, with over 400,000 voices, can help hold them to account for their promises.

Blair argues that there are two things we all need to do. The first is to challenge critics and “show people that aid really does work because the concept of aid being basically a waste of money is just not right.” His second challenge is for people in the aid community to show that they are also evolving their policies towards aid and aren’t “just stuck in the past. On the contrary there’s a lot of innovation, a lot of exciting things happening.”

But he also emphasises that a big part of convincing political leaders comes down to activists like us getting behind these issues, and that ONE members should carry on putting pressure on them “to show them that they would have support if they do the right thing.” And this is why our campaign on agriculture and food security is carrying on next year – to get real commitments to ending famine, and for all of the people who do not get enough food each day.

ONE’s next global campaign is being launched in the run up to World AIDS Day (December 1st ). We’re campaigning for the beginning of the end of AIDS by 2015. There is still a way to go but we know great results are possible.  10 years ago, just 100,000 people had access to lifesaving antiretroviral drugs to counter AIDS, and now 6.6 million people are able to take them. “Right, that’s amazing. I think on that, it’s a little bit like with the malaria campaign, you can really say it’s not true it’s all hopeless. Because otherwise what happens is that people get to the point with a lot of these campaigns where they think ‘well you know, they’re always asking me for money and they’re always telling me it’s all very difficult.’ There you’ve got a great story to tell.”

What about aiming to see 15 million people onto antiretroviral drugs, and ending mother to child transmission of the virus, both by 2015? “It can be done if people have the will to do it. And you can see that from what’s been done in the last 10 years.” As Hillary Clinton recently said, we really could be welcoming in an ‘AIDS free generation’.

While much has been achieved in Africa, in part thanks to aid coupled with strong African leadership, 400 million people still live in extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa alone. The work isn’t complete. But with government cutbacks, and the Eurozone crisis, we’re hearing more voices saying we should be cutting back on aid too. What’s the former Prime Minister’s take on this, as someone with the rare experience of having felt some of the pressures that face our current government?

“This area of policy, uniquely in my experience of politics, is one of which you can literally measure in lives the difference you can make for the better. And, I think when people talk about the aid budget, they might sort of say ‘well I’ve got all these problems at home, do I care if it’s cut or not?’ but I think when you tell them what the money is spent on… you get their support”.

He went on to talk proudly of the UK Department for International Development (DFID)’s work ; “And you know after all DFID, for example, in our case is now a very, very effective development agency, perhaps the most effective of government departments in the world. You know I see round the world projects they do they really make a difference.”

Interestingly, when it comes to development, Blair believes that this is unlike talking to people about other issue areas “in a curious way, for once you get their support in particular more than you do in general.” By focusing on how many lives could be saved, how many communities stabilised, and how, Blair is confident that as a focused movement against extreme poverty we can bring others with us.

After leaving office, Tony Blair could have chosen any number of paths. But by setting up and being Patron of the (now 4-year-old) Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative, Blair signalled that development was and remains one of the most important areas to him. But why this route; why Africa?

“When I’m seeing these African leaders struggle with their challenges… often the single most difficult thing for them is to get anything done.”

But, seeing the potential for change, Blair notes that “if they can get say, basic infrastructure done – energy, electricity, roads – if they can put the right framework in place to attract the right type of transparent investment into their country, they can probably make a go of it.“

African leaders often “pull a lever, nothing happens. And so that’s why we focus on this, because what I learnt when I was in government is that aid is not enough. I didn’t learn that aid was a bad thing; I just learned it wasn’t enough. And that, for these countries, in the end they need to govern themselves, but to govern themselves they need to show that normal politics, in the sense of getting things done, can deliver for people.”

While there are lots of challenges ahead, Blair’s message throughout this interview was that when you see just how much has been achieved through effective aid, now is absolutely not the time to cut back, but to believe in it, and do what we can to convince world leaders to keep changing lives, and continue our fight to end extreme poverty.

We’re certainly up for that challenge. Are you?

Submit your questions for the World AIDS Day event on YouTube

Nov 23rd, 2011 3:14 PM UTC
By Peter Taylor

Get ready to take part in one of the largest World AIDS Day online events ever. Next Thursday, December 1st, ONE, (RED) and an impressive list of partners and influencers are hosting a live broadcast event with an amazing group of people –- and we want you at the table, too.

The event, “The Beginning of the End of AIDS,” is a live discussion powered by YouTube, featuring former US Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Bono, Alicia Keys and more. The panel – with help from partners at the Tema Clinic in Ghana, Keep a Child Alive, the Bush Foundation, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, the Saddleback Church and others – will tackle key questions on the fight against AIDS, including where we are today, where we’re falling short, and what it’s going to take to end this preventable disease for good.

This is where you come in: we need your questions for the panel. Take a minute to watch this video from ONE CEO Michael Elliott above and visit www.youtube.com/TheONECampaign to submit your question on our YouTube channel now. Once you’re done, spread the word and ask your friends and family to vote on your question so we can present it to our distinguished panel.

AIDS used to be a death sentence. Now, remarkably, we could be looking at the beginning of the end of AIDS if certain steps are taken. So, be sure to ask your question now and mark your calendar for Thursday, December 1st at 3pm GMT/UTC to join our online YouTube event.

AIDSRelief: giving patients hope

Nov 10th, 2011 11:42 AM UTC
By ONE Partners

Leia Isanhart Balima works for Catholic Relief Services where she serves as Chief of Party for AIDSRelief Rwanda.

Last week, I visited the Bungwe Health Center, a small clinic nestled in the hills about two hours outside Rwanda’s capital city, Kigali. The center is part of AIDSRelief, a program that has been providing HIV care and treatment in Rwanda since 2005 with funding from the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).   My employer, Catholic Relief Services, is the lead agency for AIDRelief in 9 countries.

During my visit I met a nurse named Cecile and her 12-year-old patient, Jean Claude.  His mother is an AIDSRelief patient and Jean Claude had come to the health center to find out his own status. He’s been sick for quite some time.

Cecile counseled and tested Jean Claude, then talked with him about his results. To my surprise, he smiled. When asked what he will do now that he knows his HIV status, he said he will go to school to become a doctor.  Jean Claude knows that with antiretroviral therapy and good medical treatment, he can live a long, productive life.

There are thousands of such stories across PEPFAR-supported countries. Through programs like AIDSRelief, PEPFAR is bringing training and materials to health professionals like Cecile, giving patients hope instead of the death sentence they would have faced just a few years ago.

But a unique, and also remarkable, story is how Rwanda’s Ministry of Health has taken ownership of the program.  Six years ago, Catholic Relief Services and partners began AIDSRelief with the intention of someday transitioning it to a local entity. The Ministry of Health stepped up and showed it was ready, willing, and capable of taking over the project.  After two years of intensive preparation, the transition is complete. The Ministry now directly receives PEPFAR aid, sustaining the work AIDSRelief has begun.

U.S. foreign aid programs like PEPFAR are making a difference in the lives of people all over the world. These programs transition to local ownership in a meaningful, sustainable way and encourage partner countries to share responsibility for building strong health systems.

As our partners step forward, they still need our support. In the coming days and months, Congress faces more painful budget discussions and some people believe that poverty-focused international assistance isn’t worth saving.  But now is not the time to dial back successful programs that are building strong national systems to lift millions of people out of poverty and illness.

With sustained U.S. foreign aid, nurses like Cecile will continue to receive training and resources via the Ministry of Health. And Jean Claude will get the treatment he needs to realize his dreams of giving hope to others the way Cecile gave hope to him. And that’s something to celebrate and advocate for.

Sabina’s story: The promise of a generation born free of HIV

Nov 7th, 2011 3:40 PM UTC
By ONE Partners

Robert Yule, senior media relations manager of the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, shares Sabina’s inspiring, true story of life with HIV/AIDS.

The past 30 years of the AIDS epidemic have seen their share of advances and setbacks in preventing and treating the disease. Ironically, one of the greatest successes is still one of the least known. Seventeen years ago, scientists discovered how to prevent almost all new HIV infections in infants and young children.

One happy family. Sabina and Patrick with their son, Betton. Photo credit: James Pursey/ Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation

Throughout the past decade, international organizations, national governments, corporations and individual donors have joined together in a mission to eliminate pediatric AIDS worldwide. The results so far have been impressive –- prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV coverage for women in low- and middle-income countries has jumped from just 15 percent in 2005 to 53 percent in 2009. Still, that’s not nearly high enough to create a generation born free of HIV.

Organizations like the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) have been working in sub-Saharan Africa and other affected regions to bring that number up to 100 percent — and to bring the number of new HIV infections in children down to zero.

In Tanzania, for example, there were an estimated 86,000 pregnant women living with HIV in 2009. Reaching these women with lifesaving PMTCT services -– both to protect their own health and keep their children HIV-free –- is a top priority for EGPAF, the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), and the Tanzanian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare.

EGPAF recently met one mother in northwestern Tanzania who shared her account of how she found out that she was HIV-positive, and then discovered that her children didn’t have to be:

Sabina at home with her son, Betton. Photo credit: James Pursey/ Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation

Thanks to life-saving drugs, Sabina and her husband Patrick, both HIV-positive, are able to carry on a normal lifestyle. Photo credit: James Pursey/ Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.

“My name is Sabina, and I am 35 years old. I live with my husband Patrick and our four children in Busangi Village, Kahama District, Tanzania.

I work as an embroiderer and make beautiful patterns on cloths. My family and I also depend on our family farm to make a living. We plant rice, maize and cotton.

I first learned I was HIV-positive in 2009, when I was five months pregnant with my son. I had visited a clinic for a regular prenatal check-up, where I was counseled and tested for HIV and malaria.

My results came out positive, and I felt the whole world crumble around me. I called my sister who works as a nurse in Mwanza. Fortunately, she helped me understand the diagnosis, and made me realize that having HIV didn’t mean that I was going to die.

But it was still difficult. I struggled with disclosing to my husband for more than a year. I hid my drugs in the maize flour so he wouldn’t find out I was HIV-positive.

When I finally gained the courage to tell him, he reacted differently than I imagined he would. He was supportive. He went to the hospital, got tested, and was also diagnosed HIV-positive.

Since learning our HIV status, my husband and I have lived happily together. I educated my husband about living positively with HIV, and we take our drugs together.

We also worked hard to ensure that our unborn baby would stay healthy, following all of the precautions for him to be born HIV-free.

Our baby boy, Betton Patrick, is now eight months old and HIV-negative. When we found out, we celebrated with our family.

We are grateful that we have not passed this virus to any of our children. It is the best gift we can ever give them.

I can’t believe how we have overcome the odds. I encourage all women to get tested for HIV early so they too can take the right steps to stay healthy and raise HIV-negative children.”

Getting ready for World AIDS Day is as easy as 1, 2, 3

Nov 7th, 2011 3:34 PM UTC
By Malaka Gharib

Although World AIDS Day is a month away, we’d like to use the time between now and then to get our ONE members’ hearts and minds ready for the big day. Because when December 1 rolls around, we want our members to be effective, persuasive spokespeople in the fight against HIV/AIDS. So, we have a bit of homework for you to do, which I’ve outlined in three easy steps.

First, read our HIV/AIDS page in the Hot Topics section of our website. It has everything you need to know about ONE’s position on HIV/AIDS and also lists important facts about the disease.

Next, take a long, hard look at our policy goals for World AIDS Day. We believe that they are critical to helping us get to the beginning of the end of AIDS. I’ve listed them here for convenience’s sake. Read through each of these pillars carefully — there’s a lot of technical terminology, but our blog series will hopefully help explain things like microbicides, MTCT and ARVs.

1. Virtually eliminate mother-to-child transmission (MTCT): an AIDS Free Generation by 2015

Design national MTCT plans by July of 2012 for the 22 countries that account for 90% of the new child HIV infections. These plans should outline country-specific goals, strategies, and associated costs for eliminating MTCT by 2015.

Fill an estimated $2.5 billion gap for MTCT with commitments from donors, African governments, and the private sector by the end of 2015.

2. Accelerate access to treatment: 15 million people on ARVs by 2015 (15×15)

Scale up the pace of treatment initiation. Last year, we added 1.4 million people onto treatment in low and middle income countries, but we need to add even more people each year to reach 15 million people by 2015.

Scale up the resources for AIDS treatment with commitments from donors, African governments, and the private sector.

3. Implement innovative prevention techniques to stop new infections

Support existing and new prevention strategies, including male circumcision, earlier treatment initiation, microbicides, and pre-exposure prophylaxis.

Strengthen planning for prevention programs so that they are better tailored to local populations and epidemiology

And lastly, speaking of our blog series, stay tuned to the ONE Blog over the coming weeks for HIV/AIDS-related content from ONE’s global health policy team and partners. Each week, we’ll focus on a different pillar of our campaign goal. We’ll start off Pillar 1 — next week, we’ll have a piece from our friends at EGPAF and a UNAIDS infographic on PMTCT. Don’t forget to read past blog posts on HIV/AIDS, too.

Keep an eye out for a HUGE action around World AIDS Day on December 1. It’s a secret for now, but don’t say we didn’t warn you! And of course, if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to send a tweet to our global health expert Erin Hohlfelder at @Global_ErinH. She’ll be happy to answer any of your questions on this topic.

Donor funding for AIDS dips 10 percent

Aug 24th, 2011 2:32 PM UTC
By Erin Hohlfelder

Last week, the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) and UNAIDS released their annual report on donor funding for AIDS — and the news this year wasn’t great. Measuring disbursements (money out the door) rather than just commitments or pledges, KFF and UNAIDS found that funding from donor governments for AIDS in low- and middle-income countries fell for the first time, down 10% from 2009 to 2010.

Seven of the 15 governments surveyed — Australia, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United States — reported a year-over-year decrease in their disbursements as measured in their own currencies. An accompanying press release pointed to three main factors leading to the $740 million decrease: actual reductions in development assistance; currency exchange fluctuations; and a specific slowdown in the pace of US disbursements, which was not a budget cut but was instead largely the result of new Congressional requirements for PEPFAR disbursements.

This overall decrease marks a stark reversal in trends for AIDS spending. Previous KFF and UNAIDS reports cited a six-fold increase in disbursements between 2002 and 2008 before leveling in 2009, which allowed for impressive gains in the treatment and prevention of AIDS.

Particularly now — in a year that saw major breakthroughs in the potential for AIDS treatment as prevention, increased efficacy of female microbicides, and a renewed focus on bending the AIDS epidemic curve — it is disappointing to see donors fail to meet this growing momentum with appropriate increases in funding. Of course, the last year also saw a major uptick in global enthusiasm for maternal and child health issues, including vaccines (and the increased energy and funding were welcome). But with millions still in need of treatment for AIDS, simply prioritizing other health issues or citing the difficult economic environment are not sufficient excuses for slowing down funding for programs that work effectively and save lives.

For more on country-specific disbursements, as well as to see breakdowns between donors’ multilateral spending for AIDS (primarily through the Global Fund) and bilateral spending, visit KFF’s website for detailed slides.

Building a strategy to ensure no child born with HIV

Jun 15th, 2011 9:53 AM UTC
By Brooke Riley

At the recent UN High Level Meeting on AIDS, world leaders made a critical step in the right direction with the launch of a global plan to eliminate new HIV infections among children by 2015 and to keep their mothers alive. Last year, ONE members tirelessly advocated for the Global Fund during our “No Child Born with HIV” campaign, and we’re pleased that this plan will help us work towards turning that goal into reality.

Tremendous gains have been made in recent years in reducing HIV infections among children and scaling up the prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV, yet much work remains. In 2009, an estimated 370,000 new infections occurred among children, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa. The global strategy identifies two top goals: to reduce the number of new infections among children by 90 percent and reduce the number of AIDS-related maternal deaths by 50 percent. Under the plan, resources will be channelled to 22 priority countries, where nearly all HIV-positive pregnant women live.

The global plan identifies a four-prong framework for achieving these goals: preventing HIV among women of reproductive age through services related to reproductive health such as postpartum care; providing appropriate counselling and support to women living with HIV; ensuring HIV testing, counselling and access to treatment for pregnant women living with HIV; and HIV care, treatment and support for women and children living with HIV and their families.

We’re pleased to see that the global plan puts accountability at the helm and recognizes the critical importance of an integrated approach that connects an array of maternal and child health services across the health system. Additionally, the plan identifies the need for countries to be at the lead by providing political leadership, funding, effective strategies and strong monitoring and evaluation. While we applaud the effort to create this strategy, a plan is only so strong in so far as it has concerted political support and funding. Moving forward, if we hope to ensure no child is born with HIV by 2015, we need to see the following: