UNAIDS: The First 10 Years

Chapter 5and discrimination were hindering attempts at prevention, care and treatment. The conferenceconfirmed the growing politicization of the response. At the first session, held in acricket stadium, participants eagerly awaited Mbeki’s opening speech, but any hopes for achange in his views on HIV were dashed. In his opening speech, Mbeki used the occasion toreiterate his belief that extreme poverty is the leading killer across Africa.111Reading extensively from a World Health report, Mbeki said: “The world’s biggest killerand the greatest cause of ill health and suffering across the globe, including South Africa, isextreme poverty”. He added: “As I listened and heard the whole story told about our owncountry, it seemed to me that we could not blame everything on a single virus”.At the 13thInternational AIDSConference in Durban,South Africa, delegatesincluding members ofthe Treatment ActionCampaign demonstratedfor better access to HIVtreatment.Panos/Gisele WulfsohnPiot spoke immediately after Mbeki, which was difficult, as he had to hide his disappointment.He was also making an historic plea. For the first time, he was calling for billions rather thanmillions – US$ 3 billion a year to be precise – to take basic measures in Africa to deal with thedisease. And US$ 10 billion more each year to provide Africa with the standard drugs used inthe developed world. US$ 3 billion is 10 times what was then being spent on AIDS in Africa.“We need billions, not millions, to fight AIDS in this world. We can’t fight an epidemic of thismagnitude with peanuts”. He recalled that his move from the m[illions] word to the b[illions]word speech was very badly received by donor nations. All they said was, “forget it; you’redreaming; you’re irresponsible, it’s never going to happen”. He also called on some of thewealthiest nations to cancel the debt of many of the hardest hit African countries so thatsome of the US$ 15 billion spent on servicing debt every year could instead be dedicated tohealth care and HIV prevention.