President of Global Health Council Calls on Bush Administration to Lead Fight in HIV/AIDS Pandemic
A decision by President-elect Bush to "doubl[e] or even tripl[e]" U.S. resources directed toward battling the AIDS pandemic would help to "change the trajectory of our global society for the next century," Global Health Council President Nils Daulaire writes in a Washington Times op-ed. Daulaire argues that the global community is "far from being helpless" in the fight against AIDS, which according to the United Nations has already killed 22 million people, because "we in fact already possesses the tools we need to prevent millions of infections and save millions of lives." In Uganda, the HIV infection rate among pregnant women has been reduced by 50%. Thailand successfully halted an AIDS epidemic, Daulaire states, and Senegal stopped the spread of the disease from even approaching epidemic proportions. These successes, Daulaire argues, share three key elements. First, action in each situation was "precipitated by firm political commitment at the highest levels." Political leaders early on realized th
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