RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events Global AIDS crisis overblown

LONDON – As World AIDS Day is marked on Monday, some experts are growing more outspoken in complaining that AIDS is eating up funding at the expense of more pressing health needs.

They argue that the world has entered a post-AIDS era in which the disease's spread has largely been curbed in much of the world, Africa excepted.

"AIDS is a terrible humanitarian tragedy, but it's just one of many terrible humanitarian tragedies," said Jeremy Shiffman, who studies health spending at Syracuse University.

Roger England of Health Systems Workshop, a think tank based in the Caribbean island of Grenada, goes further. He argues that UNAIDS, the U.N. agency leading the fight against the disease, has outlived its purpose and should be disbanded.

"The global HIV industry is too big and out of control. We have created a monster with too many vested interests and reputations at stake, ... too many relatively well paid HIV staff in affected countries, and too many rock stars with AIDS support as a fashion accessory," he wrote in the British Medical Journal in May.

Paul de Lay, a director at UNAIDS, disagrees. It's valid to question AIDS' place in the world's priorities, he says, but insists the turnaround is very recent and it would be wrong to think the epidemic is under control.

"We have an epidemic that has caused between 55 million and 60 million infections," de Lay said. "To suddenly pull the rug out from underneath that would be disastrous."

U.N. officials roughly estimate that about 33 million people worldwide have HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Scientists say infections peaked in the late 1990s and are unlikely to spark big epidemics beyond Africa.

In developed countries, AIDS drugs have turned the once-fatal disease into a manageable illness.

England argues that closing UNAIDS would free up its $200 million annual budget for other health problems such as pneumonia, which kills more children every year than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.

"By putting more money into AIDS, we are implicitly saying it's OK for more kids to die of pneumonia," England said.

His comments touch on the bigger complaint: that AIDS hogs money and may damage other health programs.

By 2006, AIDS funding accounted for 80 percent of all American aid for health and population issues, according to the Global Health Council.

In Ethiopia, Rwanda, Uganda and elsewhere, donations for HIV projects routinely outstrip the entire national health budgets.

In a 2006 report, Rwandan officials noted a "gross misallocation of resources" in health: $47 million went to HIV, $18 million went to malaria, the country's biggest killer, and $1 million went to childhood illnesses.

"There needs to be a rational system for how to apportion scarce funds," said Helen Epstein, an AIDS expert who has consulted for UNICEF, the World Bank, and others.

AIDS advocates say their projects do more than curb the virus; their efforts strengthen other health programs by providing basic health services.

But across Africa, about 1.5 million doctors and nurses are still needed, and hospitals regularly run out of basic medicines.

Experts working on other health problems struggle to attract money and attention when competing with AIDS.

"Diarrhea kills five times as many kids as AIDS," said John Oldfield, executive vice president of Water Advocates, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that promotes clean water and sanitation.

"Everybody talks about AIDS at cocktail parties," Oldfield said. "But nobody wants to hear about diarrhea," he said.

These competing claims on public money are likely to grow louder as the world financial meltdown threatens to deplete health dollars.

"We cannot afford, in this time of crisis, to squander our investments," Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO's director-general, said in a recent statement.

Some experts ask whether it makes sense to have UNAIDS, WHO, UNICEF, the World Bank, the Global Fund plus countless other AIDS organizations, all serving the same cause.

"I do not want to see the cause of AIDS harmed," said Shiffman of Syracuse University. But "For AIDS to crowd out other issues is ethically unjust."

De Lay argues that the solution is not to reshuffle resources but to boost them.

"To take money away from AIDS and give it to diarrheal diseases or onchocerciasis (river blindness) or leishmaniasis (disfiguring parasites) doesn't make any sense," he said. "We'd just be doing a worse job in everything else."

CHICAGO — President-elect Barack Obama praised the Bush administration's effort to combat AIDS and pledged Monday to continue to fight the deadly disease when he takes office in January.

Obama discussed AIDS in videotaped remarks to the Saddleback Civil Forum on Global Health held in Washington. The remarks were released Monday while Obama was in Chicago to announce members of his national security team.

In the video, Obama noted advancements since the first World AIDS Day 20 years ago. Among the accomplishments was Bush's initiative of giving lifesaving antiretroviral treatment to people in sub-Saharan Africa.

"I salute President Bush for his leadership in crafting a plan for AIDS relief in Africa and backing it up with funding dedicated to saving lives and preventing the spread of the disease," Obama said. "And my administration will continue this critical work to address the crisis around the world."

He also urged people to recommit themselves to addressing AIDS in the United States with a strategy involving prevention, treatment and a focus on at-risk communities. Obama said everyone must help address the disease because "in the end this epidemic can't be stopped by government alone, and money alone is not the answer either."

More than one million people in the United States are living with HIV/AIDS, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

maybe the spread of aids ahs been brought under control by all the funding...
just an idea!

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President-elect Barack Obama doesn't often offer praise for President George W. Bush's foreign policy, but on Monday he offered the outgoing head of state accolades for battling AIDS in Africa.


Zimbabwean orphan Evans Mahlangu shows the free medicine he got by walking to Mozambique in February.

1 of 2 "I salute President Bush for his leadership in crafting a plan for AIDS relief in Africa and backing it up with funding dedicated to saving lives and preventing the spread of the disease," Obama said in taped remarks to the Saddleback Civil Forum on Global Health.

The videotape was played during a forum marking the 20th anniversary of World AIDS Day, established by the World Health Organization to raise awareness about the disease.

Under the Bush administration, more than 2 million people infected with HIV -- most of them in Africa -- have received lifesaving anti-retroviral treatment as part of the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR.

In July, Bush signed legislation re-authorizing the program and authorizing up to $48 billion to expand it.

Can't they just show that old "Magic" Johnson :snicker: and Arsenio Hall aids video from 1991 to everyone? Hell, all they have to do is tag on a message at the end about newer meds.

As far as Africa goes, I worked with public health people a few years ago. They gave me the low down on why AIDS keeps spreading there. Despite their best efforts, the people in many of those countries are stupid and won't listen to them. They won't use condoms. They won't change their society so as to adapt to modern living. Therefore, in many ways, we are wasting a shit ton of money trying to educate people that refuse to be educated. If that is the case, I say let 'em die.

Also, is it possible that the virus could mutate and become airborne?

she must have been one of the people* that voted for you as "Most Likely to Succeed"!

Or the one who said that the green house effect will block out half of the sun by the year 2000.

I think she was friends with another crackpot teacher who said all women will walk around topless by the year 2000.