Recent Research on HIV Prevalence Should Re-open Debate Over Funding for HIV/AIDS, Editorial Says
The findings last week by independent researchers and U.N. officials that UNAIDS overestimated HIV prevalence in some African countries over the last several years should "prompt a re-opening" of the debate over whether the disease is "overfunded" compared with other diseases, such as malaria, a Washington Post editorial says. According to the Post, UNAIDS has been "reluctant to contemplate good strategies for fighting [HIV/]AIDS lest these undermine global support for expanded funding." Although the U.N.'s credibility on HIV/AIDS "will now suffer" after last week's findings, the reactions of health officials in countries most affected by HIV/AIDS and donor agencies are more important, according to the editorial. Despite criticism surrounding the inflated HIV estimates, "[HIV/]AIDS remains likely to emerge from this necessary intellectual process as a top policy priority" because it strikes "poor countries' skilled urban people, leaving behind a generation of orphans and puncturing hopes of development progress," the editorial says (Washington Post, 4/10).
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