UNAIDS: The First 10 Years

UNAIDS The First 10 Years170PHOTO: 3BY 5 OR TREATMENT PICMany people indeveloping countries werenot fortunate enoughto receive antiretroviraltreatment. The ‘3 by5” campaign did makea difference, eventuallyproviding treatment toabout one and a halfmillion people.UNAIDS/O.O’Hanlonthe implementation [of its work]. UNAIDS has played a very important role on the technicalside of providing data that [are] universally accepted …”.UNAIDS data from countries, he says, provide credibility and a “certain legitimacy that comesfrom the seal of approval, so to speak, of UNAIDS on a number of things”.UNAIDS used its network of Country Coordinators to facilitate the launch of PEPFAR,gathering strategic information about the status of treatment programmes to help PEPFAR’sdecision-makers.PEPFAR represented a radical innovation in the way the US Government’s AIDS funding iscoordinated to ensure optimal use of resources by many different agencies. A third of themoney was earmarked for existing bilateral programmes in 75 countries and the remainingtwo thirds was for new programmes, including the Emergency Plan Worldwide which focuseson 15 countries heavily burdened by AIDS (Botswana, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Guyana, Haiti,Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Viet Namand Zambia). Each of these was to have a national coordinating authority responsible forcoordinating the country’s response to AIDS.PEPFAR aimed to provide antiretrovirals to two million people by 2008; to prevent sevenmillion new infections, and to provide care and support to 10 million HIV-infected individualsand children orphaned by AIDS.There was no shortage of controversy surrounding PEPFAR’s policies. Congressional rulesgoverning how PEPFAR funds could be used for HIV prevention have been the source ofsubstantial international criticism. In addition, US Government funds could not lawfully beused for needle exchange programmes for injecting drug users. Perhaps most controversial