International HIV/AIDS funding to African nations inadequate, MSF says

"African nations are not receiving adequate international funding to fight HIV/AIDS, leaving them to face catastrophic consequences without enough medication, an independent, global medical and humanitarian organization said Thursday," the Associated Press reports. "In a statement released in Johannesburg ahead of the [AIDS 2012] conference in Washington starting July 22, [Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF)] said African countries worst-affected by the pandemic were the least able to provide 'the best science' available to fight it," the news service writes.

"The group said that while world data by the U.N. has pointed to gains over the disease, donors have scaled back on earlier funding commitments to Africa," adding that "African countries were being increasingly urged to find their own domestic solutions to the AIDS pandemic," the AP notes. "At the Washington summit, leaders and scientists are scheduled to review programs aimed at eventually eradicating AIDS," but "plans to increase treatment and improve the quality of care in developing countries now risks being scrapped entirely as international support stagnated, the organization said," according to the AP (Shaw, 7/19).