Time to increase efforts against HIV/AIDS, TB

Oct 1 2011

In a Huffington Post opinion piece, Kolleen Bouchane, director of ACTION, asks whether President Barack Obama will "heed Archbishop [Desmond] Tutu's call to action" in a recent Washington Post opinion piece "and do his part to end AIDS." She says, "While campaigning, President Obama promised to expand PEPFAR 'by $1 billion a year in new money over the next five years' and provide $50 billion by 2013 to fight HIV/AIDS worldwide. We are not on track to see even those promises become reality. We are not on track for the leadership to change the course of HIV and AIDS that Tutu has called for."

In the fight against HIV/AIDS, "[a]ll the facts show that this is the time to ramp up efforts, not slow down," Bouchane writes, adding that as the 2012 International AIDS Conference approaches, "the end of a global public health nightmare is within our reach. Are we confident that U.S. leadership on HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis will acknowledge the evidence about what is possible and rise to this challenge?" (9/29).