It is still possible” to end AIDS by 2030, but a growing funding gap is holding back accelerated progress, the United Nations said on Thursday.
A roadmap presented in the latest report by the UN Programme on HIV/AIDS, UNAIDS, “shows that success is possible in this decade,” UNAIDS Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima stressed.
The end of AIDS is first and foremost a political and financial choice, according to UNAIDS, which stresses the need to tackle inequalities, support communities and civil society organisations in the response, and ensure adequate and sustainable funding.
Ms Byanyima noted in this regard that progress has been greatest in countries and regions that have invested the most financially. She cited Eastern and Southern Africa, where new infections have fallen by 57% since 2010.
As a result, Botswana, Eswatini, Rwanda, Tanzania and Zimbabwe have already achieved the so-called '95-95-95' targets.
This means that, in those countries, 95% of people living with HIV know their HIV status, 95% are on life-saving antiretroviral treatment and 95% of those on treatment have a suppressed viral load, and are therefore no longer transmitting the virus.
Sixteen other countries, including eight in sub-Saharan Africa – the region where 65% of the world’s HIV-positive people live – are close to achieving this goal.
In 2022, one person still died every minute from AIDS, and almost 9.2 million people were still not on treatment, including 660,000 HIV-positive children.
Laws that criminalise high-risk populations or their behaviour are still in force in much of the world, UNAIDS stresses.
