Advertise With UsAdvertise on our extensive network of industry websites and newsletters.
Get the PBR newsletterSign up to our free email to get all the latest PBR
news.In advance of this year's G8 summit, the leaders of the four key health policy and financing organizations have jointly announced that they welcome the focus on infectious diseases and urge the G8 leaders to continue their commitments to improving the health and lives of people in the world's poorest countries.
Subscribe to our email newsletter
The four organizations are the World Health Organization (WHO), the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and the GAVI Alliance.
At last year’s G8 meeting in Gleneagles, leaders committed to reaching “as close as possible to universal access” to AIDS treatment by the year 2010. They also said they would work to significantly reduce HIV infections with the aim of an AIDS-free generation in Africa and scaling up the global AIDS response significantly.
The year 2005 also produced real commitments to human development. The G8 leaders pledged to write off most of the multilateral debts in 18 of the world’s poorest countries, double aid to Africa, and increase investment in health.
“The G8 commitments to health in the past have made a real difference,” said Dr Anders Nordstrom, acting director-general of the WHO. “The focus this year on emerging and long-term threats such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, pandemic influenza and polio demonstrate that health and human health security are at the top of the global agenda. This attention by the world’s wealthiest nations will directly benefit people living in all countries.”
The G8 focus on health in past years led directly to strengthening UNAIDS and to the creation of the Global Fund, which has leveraged pledges of $9 billion to prevent, diagnose and treat these diseases.
“The support demonstrated by G8 leaders for the AIDS response has been, and continues to be crucial to getting ahead of the epidemic,” said Dr Peter Piot, executive director of UNAIDS. “We must build on the commitments made last year to make universal access to HIV treatment, prevention and care a reality.”
The G8 summit will take place from July 15 to July 17 in St Petersburg, Russia. The official agenda includes three issues: global energy security, education and fighting infectious diseases.