Skip to main content

Donald Trump's Aid Freeze Could Cause Millions Of Deaths Due To AIDS: UN

President Donald Trump's decision to suspend US overseas funding could result in millions more deaths from AIDS, the head of the UN's programme for the illness warned Sunday. The United States is the world's largest provider of official development assistance, with most funds directed through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

Trump ordered the bulk of US foreign assistance to be frozen for three months on returning to office in January, leaving global humanitarians scrambling to deal with the fallout.

"It's dramatic in many countries," UNAIDS executive director Winnie Byanyima told AFP.

"I need to sound the alarm so that it's very clear that this is a big part (of AIDS relief funding). If it goes away, people are going to die."

The US move included a 90-day suspension of all work by the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), although his administration later issued waivers for medication under the programme.

'Tenfold' death increase

That programme supports more than 20 million HIV patients and 270,000 health workers, according to an analysis from the Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR).

"We could see additional deaths increasing by tenfold" to 6.3 million in five years, Byanyima said, citing UNAIDS estimates.

"Or we could see new infections increase up to 8.7 million" in the same period, she said.

The United States has said that "life-saving treatments" would be exempt from the freeze -- although front-line workers in Africa say facilities have already closed.

Speaking on the sidelines of the African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, Byanyima said she had discussed the issue with leaders, urging them to transition from foreign funding towards using domestic revenue.

But she noted many African nations were saddled with huge debts -- some at "more than 50 percent of their entire revenue collections" -- which crippled their ability to even begin to plug the potential shortfall.

"Part of the answer is in pushing very hard for an immediate and comprehensive debt restructuring," she said.

"For many of them, debt is crowding out what could be spent on health and education."

Founded in 1961, USAID has an annual budget of more than $40 billion, used to support development, health and humanitarian programmes around the world, especially in poor countries.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)



from NDTV News-World-news https://ift.tt/79aSTmE

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sri Lanka Must Achieve Debt Restructuring By September: IMF

The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday reaffirmed that Sri Lanka must achieve its debt restructuring process by September, which is also the time for the global lender's formal review of the bailout facility it extended to the cash-strapped nation. On March 20, IMF extended a nearly $3 billion bailout facility to debt-ridden Sri Lanka that would help stabilise the country's economy after it was jolted by a devastating economic crisis last year. In a statement issued on Tuesday at the end of a nearly two weeks staff visit to Colombo to assess the progress made by Sri Lanka since the agreement was reached, the IMF said the two sides had discussed the developments on debt restructuring. "Sri Lanka must achieve debt restructuring by its first review due in September. We also discussed progress on debt restructuring, noting the ongoing discussions with both foreign and domestic creditors," the statement read. Sri Lanka is still struggling to normalise its crisis-hi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Amazon Rainforest Tribe's Secret To Healthy Life And Slow Ageing Revealed

Deep in the Amazon rainforest, a semi-nomadic indigenous community is thriving. This community defies conventional norms on ageing and health. The Tsimanes, consisting of 16,000 people, live a fully subsistence lifestyle, relying on hunting, foraging and farming to survive. Scientists have been studying this unique group for two decades, and have uncovered remarkable findings till now. Martina Canchi Nate, an 84-year-old Tsimanes woman, digs up yucca trees, cuts down plantain trees and carries heavy loads with ease, faster than her younger companions, as per a BBC report. This level of physical activity is not unusual among Tsimanes of her age. Researchers have discovered that this group has the healthiest arteries ever studied and brains that age more slowly than those in North America, Europe and elsewhere. The Tsimanes' secret lies in their active lifestyle, with an average of 16,000 to 17,000 steps per day. They spend less than 10 percent of daylight hours in sedentary activ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Egypt Unveils First Ancient Royal Tomb Since Tutankhamun In 1922

Egypt's antiquities authority says it has found the ancient tomb of King Thutmose II, the first royal burial to be located since the famed discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922. The tomb, discovered near the Valley of the Kings in Luxor in southern Egypt, belonged to King Thutmose II of the 18th dynasty, who lived nearly 3,500 years ago. Thutmose II was an ancestor to Tutankhamun himself, and his half-sister and queen consort was Pharaoh Hatshepsut. Her giant mortuary temple stands on the west bank of the Nile at Luxor a few kilometres (miles) from where the tomb of Thutmose II was found. Although preliminary studies suggest its contents were moved in ancient times -- leaving the tomb without the iconic mummy or gilded splendour of the Tutankhamun find -- the antiquities ministry on Tuesday called the discovery "one of the most significant archaeological breakthroughs in recent years". It has been excavated by a joint Egyptian-British mission, led by the Suprem...
Post a Comment
Read more