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31 March, 2006April 2006
G8 Working Group on HIV/AIDS – Global Unions Increase Pressure
On 28 February, Global Unions launched an HIV/AIDS Campaign to convince Heads of State at the G8 Summit in Russia in July to create a permanent high-level G8 working group on HIV/AIDS.
Alan Leather, Chair of the HIV/AIDS Global Unions Steering Committee, called on national union bodies in G8 countries to deliver letters to their Head of State and on unions the world over to deliver such letter calling for the establishment of a Working Group to the G8 government embassies in their country. This action forms part of the overall work of the Trade Union Advisory Group of the OECD (TUAC) and the Global Unions to influence the G8 outcome next July, which will focus on energy security, education and health issues.
For more details see the Global Unions statement at http://www.global-unions.org/pdf/ohsewpT_8.EN.pdf. The draft letter for unions in G8 countries to their Heads of State is provided at http://www.global-unions.org/pdf/ohsewpT_7.EN.rtf as well as 7a, b and c for the respective country groups to deliver letters to the embassies.
The Kenya Plantations and Agricultural Workers’ Union became the first union to join the campaign by delivering a letter to the British High Commissioner in Nairobi. The union told the High Commissioner that a permanent working group was needed to guarantee progress on the commitments made by governments at the Gleneagles G8 Summit last year to achieve universal access to treatment by 2010 and to further the development of a vaccine to prevent HIV infection.
Focus on Women
On International Women’s Day, 8 March, ILOAIDS emphasised that there is more and more evidence about the susceptibility of women and girls to HIV transmission due to both gender inequalities and biological differences between men and women: 60 percent of new HIV infections occur to women, with even higher proportions for women under 25 years.
The ILO drew attention to the Code of Practice on HIV/AIDS and the world of work. Principle 3 of the Code states, “The gender dimension of HIV/AIDS should be recognised. Women are more likely infected and more often adversely affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic than men due to biological, socio-cultural and economic reasons. The greater the gender discrimination in societies and the lower the position of women, the more negatively they are affected. Therefore, more equal gender relations and the empowerment of women are vital to successfully prevent the spread of HIV infection and enable women to cope with HIV/AIDS”. (Source: ILOAIDS Website)
The joint WHO/UNAIDS report (see below) states, “While the report found no systematic bias against women in (antiretroviral treatment) ART access, rates of coverage for women varied. In some countries, more women receive treatment; in others, more men."
"One notable area of concern is access to therapy to prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission, which remains unacceptably low. Between 2003 and 2005, fewer than 10% of HIV-positive pregnant women received antiretroviral prophylaxis before or during childbirth. As a result, 1800 infants were born with HIV every day. Each year, over 570 000 children under the age of 15 die of AIDS, most having acquired HIV from their mothers. In 2005, 660 000 children under the age of 15 were in need of immediate ART, representing more than 10% of unmet global need. Nine out of ten children needing treatment live in sub-Saharan Africa.” (Source: WHO/UNAIDS News Release, 28 March 2006)
HIV/AIDS disproportionately affects women and girls in Africa, necessitating a new U.N. agency to focus specifically on women and HIV/AIDS, U.N. Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa Stephen Lewis said at a news conference on 17 March.
Lewis, who had just returned from a trip to Lesotho and Swaziland, said a recent government study shows that 56% of pregnant women in Swaziland between ages 25 and 29 are living with HIV/AIDS and that about 30% of 15- to 17-year-old girls in Lesotho are living with the disease. An estimated 43% of HIV-positive people ages 15 to 49 in Lesotho are men, and about 57% are women.
The rate of HIV-positive women in Swaziland is "the highest prevalence I have ever encountered in the last five years," Lewis said. He added, "What has happened to women is such a gross and palpable violation of human rights that the funding must be found," saying that a well-funded and influential agency targeting women would reduce the HIV prevalence within the group. (Source: Reuters Canada, 17 March 2006)
WHO-UNAIDS: 3 by 5 Initiatives Short of Target
A new report by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) shows that the number of people on HIV antiretroviral treatment (ART) in low- and middle-income countries more than tripled to 1.3 million in December 2005 from 400 000 in December 2003.
Charting the final progress of the "3 by 5" strategy to expand access to HIV therapy in the developing world, the report also says that the lessons learned in the last two years provide a foundation for global efforts now underway to provide universal access to HIV treatment by 2010.
Progress in treatment scale-up, while substantial, was less than initially hoped. (Reminder: “3 by 5” stands for treatment for 3 million infected persons by the end of 2005). The report notes, however, that treatment access expanded in every region of the world during the “3 by 5” initiative, with approximately 50 000 additional people beginning ART every month in the past year.
Sub-Saharan Africa, the region most severely impacted, led the scale-up effort, with the number of people receiving HIV treatment there increasing more than eight-fold to 810 000 from 100 000 in the two-year period. By the end of 2005, more than half of all people receiving HIV treatment in low- and middle-income countries resided in sub-Saharan Africa, up from one-quarter two years earlier.
In July 2005, the G8 nations endorsed a goal of working with WHO and UNAIDS to develop an essential package of HIV prevention, treatment and care with the aim of moving as close as possible to universal access to treatment by 2010, a target subsequently endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2005.
The new WHO/UNAIDS report outlines a number of steps that must be taken to continue and expand treatment scale up toward achieving this goal.
(Source: Joint News Release WHO/UNAIDS, 28 March 2006. The full report can be accessed on the WHO and UNAIDS websites www.who.int and www.unaids.org ).
East Asia and Pacific Conference Focuses on Children
An estimated 1.5 million children in the Asia-Pacific region have lost one or both parents; 121,000 children are HIV positive and about 35,000 children in the region are in need of antiretroviral treatment. These were the stark figures, which confronted delegates at a three-day conference in Hanoi in March.
The first high-level conference, concentrating solely on children, discussed how to intensify prevention efforts, upscale treatment and eliminate mother-to child transmission. Support groups for kids infected by the virus, or who have lost parents to AIDS, must also be created.
(Source: Posted on www.medicalnewstoday.com on 24 March and Borneo Bulletin, Brunei, 23 March 2006)
Reductions in Drug Prices
Hardly a week goes by without news that that the price of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) is coming down and more multinational pharmaceutical companies agree to license their drugs for the production of generics. While the efforts of individual companies are appreciated, a more coordinated and comprehensive approach is called for. UNAIDS noted that further price cuts were needed to achieve universal access to ARVs by 2010.
In Nigeria, efforts are being made with the help of Evans Medical, a UK-based pharmaceutical company, to bring treatment to 250,000 infected persons. These ARVs are locally manufactured and would thus help to ensure availability and affordability. An estimated 3.6 million Nigerians are currently infected; many of them need treatment but very few receive it.
There are only 50 ARV treatment sites in Africa’s most populous country and only approximately 17,000 patients receive consistent aid. In early March, Merck announced a 20-percent reduction of its ARV Stocrin to patients in developing countries.
Critics of price cuts claim that even with the reduction, the majority of patients in third-world countries lack the financial ability to afford such medication. In lieu of further reductions, the alternative is to make cheaply priced generics more widespread.
In the March e-bulletin, we reported on a deal between Bristol-Myers Squibb and two generic drug makers (Aspen Pharmacare in South Africa and Emcure Pharmaceuticals in India) to make its second-line ARV available at lower cost. Roche, a Swiss pharmaceutical company signed a similar agreement licensing its second-line ARV for generic production and marketing in sub-Saharan Africa.
These are important developments as patients often become resistant to first-line drugs within a year and must change to second-line therapies, which, so far, have been up to ten times more expensive.
HIV/AIDS Menace in Indian Call Centres
A study on sexual attitudes and practice of employees in call centres and business-process-outsourcing firms found that there is an alarming rise in the percentage of respondents who have multiple sexual partners and unprotected sex – as opposed to an earlier study of the general population.
The boom in IT-related outsourced industries has challenged traditional society and has created social conditions and new life-style practices among upward-mobile workers that can promote HIV transmission. The Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS (GBC) has launched its HIV/AIDS Call Centre Initiative, which includes a comprehensive prevention programme and access to testing and support services.
Although the prevalence rate in India is still relatively low, in a population of over one billion that translates into more than five million Indians being HIV positive.
(Source: Press Release of the GBC, 20 March on www.businessfightsaids.org and various Indian newspapers)
News from the Global Fund
Dr. Robert Feachem, the Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM), has announced that he will leave his position when his current contract expires on 15 July, or as soon thereafter as a successor can be put in place. Feachem will be remembered as the man who took the Global Fund from dream to reality.
When he started, the Global Fund had only a dozen staff, and it had not signed a single grant agreement or disbursed a single dollar. Nearly four years later, it has 200 staff, it has signed 390 grant agreements worth USD 3.6 billion and it has disbursed over USD 2 billion.
As of 5 March, funds contributed and pledged to the Fund by donors totalled USD 8.5 billion of which nearly USD 5 billion had actually been received. For Round 1 to 5, grants nearly USD 5 billion have been approved and more than USD 2 billion has been disbursed to principal recipients. The rest of the funds pledged has been committed already.
It is therefore not clear when a call for proposals for Round 6 will be made, as at present there is no money to pay for new grants. Thus there is a real threat that Round 6 grants will not be approved well into 2007.
(Source: Global Fund Observer, Issue 55 of 5 March 2006)
Note: The Global Fund Observer is an independent source of news, analysis and commentary about the GFATM. To receive it you can send an email to [email protected]. The subject line and text can be left blank.
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