The end of AIDS: a politician’s promise or a 21st reality?

In 1980, the World Health Organisation declared the world had become free of smallpox. Skip to today and Polio has decreased 99%, since 1988, over 290 million mosquito nets  protecting against malaria have been delivered to Africa alone and incredibly, 80% of cholera cases are now treatable.

The world is becoming a healthier place and doctors are making sure that diseases fill the chapters of history books rather than the pages of hospital records.  It’s an exciting time.

So it probably shouldn’t come as a huge shock that the “beginning of the end of AIDS” is the world’s next big possibility. Treatment of AIDS has become incredibly effective. With antiretroviral drugs, more commonly known as ARVs or ART drugs, reducing the risk of the disease by 96% and pretty much eliminating the HIV transfer between mother and child, eradication is the next stop.

So what is AIDS?

Well AIDS is a disease that attacks the human immune system. AIDS is caused by HIV which is an infection that gradually takes over the body, producing more and more cells, until the body’s immune system is so weak that it can no longer fend for itself.

AIDS is not a purely African or homosexual disease, with approximately 1.1 million people living with HIV/AIDS in the USA alone. You can become infected during sex, by becoming exposed to infected body tissues or fluids, or babies can be infected by catching the disease from their mothers. As Dr. Patricia Nkansah-Asamoah, a doctor in Ghana, recently said at the ONE Campaign’s conference in London, you cannot catch AIDS from sharing a cup or holding hands with an infected person. 

Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State

1^st December 2012 was World AIDS day, not that anyone would have known due to the lack of red ribbons on sale, and the fight starts now.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unveiled, on Thursday, that the US has a "blueprint" to guide global efforts in wiping out the AIDS virus BUT the UN estimates that there is roughly still a $6 billion annual funding gap for AIDS.

However, with President Obama posing a $330million cut to the Global Health Initiative, which is targeting diseases like AIDS, how can the US government claim to be at the forefront of the fight against AIDS?

We may be living in tough times, but this is a matter of life and death. Literally.