On the basis of new evidence that shows HIV treatment is also HIV prevention, the Governments have taken a critical step by committing to reach 15 million people with HIV treatment by 2015 in a meeting at the UN Summit on AIDS. However, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and doctors without borders feels that to make this treatment target a reality, the governments must take immediate concrete action.
Fresh scientific evidence shows that treatment is also a form of prevention, as it reduces the risk of transmission of HIV from one person to another by 96 per cent. By ambitiously expanding treatment, according to new research by UNAIDS, twelve million infections and more than seven million deaths can be averted by 2020. It could also reduce by more than half the number of new infections by 2015. This will require an additional $ 6 billion top up each year until 2015.
However, funding for AIDS declined in both 2009 and 2010, leaving the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, the US-government’s PEPFAR and other programmes short of resources.
“There are nine million people waiting for HIV treatment today. This whole AIDS Summit will have been a farce if we do not see real plans to ramp up treatment so we can get ahead of the wave of new infections,” said Dr Tido von Schoen-Angerer, executive director of MSF’s Access Campaign.
“By agreeing to expand HIV treatment to 15 million people in four years, governments are committing to take the latest science that treatment is prevention and turn it into policies that save lives and can stop the virus,” said Sharonann Lynch, HIV/AIDS Policy Advisor for MSF’s Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines.
Countries also need to ensure that the medicines needed to break the back of the epidemic remain affordable. This means not just supporting policies that drive down prices, but refraining from pushing policies that drive up prices by imposing ever tighter intellectual property protection. In particular, free trade agreements negotiated by the US, the EU and others with developing countries are creating further barriers to price-busting generic competition, and threaten access to affordable newer medicines.
According to Michelle Childs, policy and advocacy director of MSF’s Access Campaign, “Without affordable medicines, access to treatment cannot become a reality. Over six million people are on treatment today, largely because generic production drove the price of the first generation of AIDS medicines down by 99 per cent since 2000. This success can only be repeated with newer and more potent medicines if barriers to-low cost drug production are removed. But countries are making promises to treat AIDS in one meeting and working hard to keep prices out of reach behind closed doors in other meetings. This double-speak has to stop.”
The final declaration ending the UN General Assembly High-Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS is expected to be formally endorsed by countries on 10 June.
Source:Pharmabiz
Fresh scientific evidence shows that treatment is also a form of prevention, as it reduces the risk of transmission of HIV from one person to another by 96 per cent. By ambitiously expanding treatment, according to new research by UNAIDS, twelve million infections and more than seven million deaths can be averted by 2020. It could also reduce by more than half the number of new infections by 2015. This will require an additional $ 6 billion top up each year until 2015.
However, funding for AIDS declined in both 2009 and 2010, leaving the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, the US-government’s PEPFAR and other programmes short of resources.
“There are nine million people waiting for HIV treatment today. This whole AIDS Summit will have been a farce if we do not see real plans to ramp up treatment so we can get ahead of the wave of new infections,” said Dr Tido von Schoen-Angerer, executive director of MSF’s Access Campaign.
“By agreeing to expand HIV treatment to 15 million people in four years, governments are committing to take the latest science that treatment is prevention and turn it into policies that save lives and can stop the virus,” said Sharonann Lynch, HIV/AIDS Policy Advisor for MSF’s Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines.
Countries also need to ensure that the medicines needed to break the back of the epidemic remain affordable. This means not just supporting policies that drive down prices, but refraining from pushing policies that drive up prices by imposing ever tighter intellectual property protection. In particular, free trade agreements negotiated by the US, the EU and others with developing countries are creating further barriers to price-busting generic competition, and threaten access to affordable newer medicines.
According to Michelle Childs, policy and advocacy director of MSF’s Access Campaign, “Without affordable medicines, access to treatment cannot become a reality. Over six million people are on treatment today, largely because generic production drove the price of the first generation of AIDS medicines down by 99 per cent since 2000. This success can only be repeated with newer and more potent medicines if barriers to-low cost drug production are removed. But countries are making promises to treat AIDS in one meeting and working hard to keep prices out of reach behind closed doors in other meetings. This double-speak has to stop.”
The final declaration ending the UN General Assembly High-Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS is expected to be formally endorsed by countries on 10 June.
Source:Pharmabiz
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