Progress in AIDS fight in peril as governments renege on funding pledges

In this Toronto Star opinion piece, Richard Elliott, executive director of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, and Nicci Stein, executive director of the Interagency Coalition on AIDS and Development, discuss how progress made in the fight against HIV/AIDS over the last 30 years "is in peril, due to governments reneging on repeated promises to fund the fight against the pandemic."

"[S]topping the AIDS pandemic requires sustained engagement from both donor and developing countries, political commitments that are backed by dollars. ... Yet many donor countries have chosen precisely this moment to abandon their promises," they write. They discuss the cancellation of Round 11 grants by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and ask the Canadian government to deliver on its HIV/AIDS funding pledges. Elliott and Stein conclude, "We can turn the tide on the spread of HIV -- victory has never been closer. But we need to make sure that those with the power and the money use it toward achieving the goal of an end to AIDS" (12/7).