Nov 24, 2006  Africa: Global Apartheid Update http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/hdr0611a.php
    Speaking at the global launch of the 2006 Human Development Report in Cape Town, South African President Thabo Mbeki called for the world to fight "domestic and global apartheid in terms of access to water." The report documented high levels of inequality both within and between nations, with sub-Saharan African countries losing some five percent of GDP annually as a result of the water and sanitation crisis, far more than the region receives in international aid.

Nov 15, 2006  Africa: Global Fund as Legacy of Innovation http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/gf0611.php
    After more than 20 hours of deliberations early this month, the board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria was unable to agree on a new executive director. Despite the resulting delay, some observers say the failure actually indicates how seriously the Fund is taking its mandate to build a consensus between developed and developing countries.

Sep 30, 2006  Africa: Making Aid Multilateral http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0609a.php
    The current international aid system, says a new UN report, is chaotic, and suffers from high transaction costs, politicization, lack of transparency, incoherence, and unpredictability. What is needed, says the report, is a shift to a multilateral model similar to the Marshall Plan and to the European Community's regional funds.

Sep 30, 2006  Africa: Innovative Financing http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0609b.php
    Beginning in July, international air travelers from France have been paying a 4 euro tax on an economy ticket and 40 euros on a first-class ticket, with proceeds going to pay for treatment of children with AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. Eighteen other countries have pledged to implement the tax, including Brazil, the United Kingdom, Norway, Mali, and South Korea.

Sep 23, 2006  Africa: Girl Power http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/educ0609.php
    "Girls who complete secondary school are up to five time less likely to contract HIV than girls with no education," according to a new ActionAid review of over 600 research studies. But in Africa, an estimated 22 million girls have never been to primary school.

Aug 18, 2006  Africa: Too Little for Too Few http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/msf0608.php
    Ten times more people in Africa are getting life-saving HIV drugs than three years ago, reported Reuters this week from the XVI International AIDS Conference in Toronto, but most still get no treatment and the pandemic continues to spread worldwide. Fewer than ten percent of HIV-infected pregnant women in low- and middle-income countries get treatment to protect their newborn from infection.

Jul 1, 2006  Africa: AIDS Treatment Progress Reports http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aids0606.php
    Newly-compiled performance results show that as of end April, 544,000 people have begun antiretroviral (ARV) treatment through Global Fund-supported programs - up from 384,000 six months ago. And despite the pressures for competition between the U.S. bilateral PEFPAR program and the Global Fund, reports from implementing agencies say the stress on operational level is on how to use resources from both programs to maximize action against AIDS. But sustainability of funding is a looming obstacle, with the projected overall funding gap for this year at some $5 billion.

Jun 3, 2006  Africa: AIDS Epidemic Update http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/hiv0606a.php
    "Sub-Saharan Africa remains the worst-affected region in the world. ... Overall, HIV prevalence in this region appears to be levelling off, albeit at exceptionally high levels in southern Africa. Such apparent 'stabilization' of the epidemic reflects situations where the numbers of people being newly infected with HIV roughly match the numbers of people dying of AIDS-related illnesses." - 2006 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic

Jun 3, 2006  Africa: Backsliding on AIDS Commitments http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/hiv0606b.php
    "U.N. Strengthens Call for a Global Battle against AIDS," reads the headline in the New York Times. But AIDS activist groups that demonstrated and lobbied for specific commitments and strong language at the UN meeting on AIDS disagreed. Instead, they accused governments of backsliding and failing to adopt specific targets against which they could be held accountable.

Apr 28, 2006  Africa: Keeping Health Commitments http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/hiv0604.php
    The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has announced a sixth round of grant proposals for this year, despite fears that the global effort could falter for lack of sufficient funds. But the momentum of global health efforts is still in doubt, with crucial evaluation meetings coming up in Abuja, Nigeria and in New York this month.

Apr 2, 2006  Africa: User Fees http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/user0604.php
    "The government of Zambia today (1 April) introduced free health care for people living in rural areas, scrapping fees which for years had made health care inaccessible for millions. The move was made possible using money from the debt cancellation and aid increases agreed at the G8 in Gleneagles last July, when Zambia received $4 billion of debt relief; money it is now investing in health and education." - Oxfam International

Mar 4, 2006  Africa: Universal Access Initiative http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/acc0603.php
    AIDS activists and observers say the new "universal access by 2010" initiative is disturbingly vague and short on specific targets, with at least 4 million people still facing premature death from AIDS if they do not receive treatment. The "3 by 5" initiative, launched in 2003, targeted having 3 million people in developing countries on antiretroviral treatment for AIDS by the end of 2005. The last report, in June 2005, showed that the number had more than doubled, from 400,000 at the end of 2003 to approximately 1 million. But the year-end target was missed by at least 1 million, and there is still no detailed report for December 2005.

Feb 16, 2006  Africa: AIDS Optimism http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/farm0602.php
    "[Four years ago] people like me were sick and tired, already, of defeatist arguments [about AIDS], which had gone on way too long already. To ask doctors, nurses, and other providers to give up on treating the sick because they're too poor to pay was never, ever acceptable to my co-workers in the field....We're still arguing, it's true, but we're not arguing about the same things. Instead of arguing whether or not to treat the poor who suffer from AIDS, or drug-resistant tuberculosis, or even drug- resistant malaria, we're arguing about what drugs should be used to treat these diseases." - Paul Farmer, November 2005

Feb 16, 2006  South Africa: New AIDS Statistics http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aids0602.php
    A new study released this month estimates that 4.8 million people, or approximately 10.8 percent of South Africans over the age of 2, are now living with HIV/AIDS. The nation-wide survey, carried out by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), was close to the estimates produced by the latest Actuarial Society of South Africa (ASSA) computer model, released in December. Both studies provide new detailed breakdowns of data, with the HSRC survey showing, for example, rates of AIDS prevalence as high as 17.6 percent in informal (slum) residential areas.