International development organisations in the UK have expressed dismay over the UK’s new pledge to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which they say falls far short of expectations.
The Global Fund is an international funding facility that provides grants to developing country governments and organisations that are tackling AIDS, Malaria and TB. The UK, one of the Fund’s biggest donors, has provided £100 million (approx. $ 200 million) to the fund every year for the past three years. The international development secretary, Douglas Alexander has now promised £1 billion over the next eight years, which equates to around £ 125 million per year.
While the new pledge is an increase on previous donations, it does not tie-in with the promise made by the G8 in July this year to triple donations to the Global Fund by 2010. It has also come as a great disappointment to many who were hoping Gordon Brown, the UK’s new Prime Minister, would continue his previously demonstrated interest in international development issues by increasing international aid.
"It is astonishing how quickly promises become meaningless. In June the G8 promised to treble the size of the Global Fund by 2010, in order to tackle three diseases that kill 6 million people each year. Then in July, at the UN, Gordon Brown claimed moral leadership by warning the world that promises to tackle poverty and disease must be not be broken. Yet today the government has done exactly that, and sadly the effect will be felt by millions of people affected by Aids, TB and malaria across the world," said Steve Cockburn of the UK’s Stop AIDS Campaign.
The UK’s pledge is important both for financing Global Fund programmes and for encouraging others to increase their donations to the Fund. The USA for example has agreed to provide one third of total Global Fund money each year. The less money fellow donors pledge, the less the USA is therefore obliged to donate.
Greater funding for AIDS in particular is desperately needed to achieve the international target of universal access to HIV treatment, care and prevention by 2010. A new report from UNAIDS this week suggested that there is already a US$ 8.1 billion funding gap for 2007 alone. By 2010, around $ 42 billion will be required to ensure that at least 80% of people living with HIV worldwide have access to the services they need. At the current rate of increase, only around $ 17 billion is actually likely to be available.
“The lack of investment 10-20 years ago in the AIDS response, particularly in strengthening health systems and on issues contributing to the drivers of the epidemic such as violence against women and education has resulted in a more serious epidemic and the higher levels of funding needed today,” UNAIDS claims.
The report presents two scenarios for reaching universal access worldwide. The first would see universal access achieved by 2010 and would require a dramatic expansion of services in all low- and middle-income countries affected by AIDS. The second would achieve universal access in 2015 through a phased scale-up based upon individual country targets. This would allow countries to expand services at a more manageable pace and would cost less in the long-term, but more lives would ultimately be lost.
More information about the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria and the Universal Access by 2010 goals are available on the AVERT website.
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