Clinton, Gates push for more efficient HIV/AIDS programmes (Roundup)

Jul 19, 2010, 16:03 GMT

Vienna - Former US president Bill Clinton and Microsoft founder Bill Gates urged HIV/AIDS organizations Monday to deliver their services more efficiently and stop waste in the wake of the global economic crisis.

At the biennial International AIDS Conference in Vienna, which both men were addressing, advocates have warned that the United States and other countries might lower their funding in the fight against the global virus epidemic.

'Every dollar we waste today puts a life at risk,' said Clinton.

Both he and Gates have started foundations that are major players in the fight against HIV/AIDS.

'Our first task is to scale up prevention efforts that are cheap, efficient and easy to apply,' Gates said.

He called for pursuing male circumcision, for making health institutions more efficient, and for the use of simpler HIV tests.

Clinton said organizations waste too much money on sending Western experts to affected countries and on producing reports, he said.

The Clinton Foundation helps to lower treatment costs for HIV/AIDS and to build up health services to provide such treatment.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is one of the biggest contributors to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which finances HIV/AIDS treatment around the world.

The Global Fund's executive director Michel Kazatchkine responded to Gates' and Clinton's suggestions by saying that his organization was trying to be more efficient.

But Kazatchkine warned against not adequately supporting the fund.

'So let me be clear,' he said. 'The replenishment will only be a success if if we are able to raise enough funds not only to continue existing programmes but also to fund large-scale additional programs.'

Increased spending on treating infected people will become necessary under new World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines for treating HIV, which were issued Monday.

The WHO advises that people should be treated earlier, while their immune systems are still relatively strong, to reduce the HIV-related death rate by 20 per cent.

The new guidelines effectively raise the number of people needing HIV treatment from 10 to 15 million. Only 5.2 million received such virus-fighting medication last year.

Access to such medicines is especially poor in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, where young people bear the brunt of the epidemic, according to the UN childrens' fund, UNESCO.

Governments should stop stigmatizing young drug users. and sex workers with HIV and instead implement preventive programs, UNESCO said.

Bill Gates also criticized countries in that region for not making decisions based on proven efficient strategies, such as needle exchanges for drug users.

'Instead they make them based on fear and stigma,' he said.