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	Help end new HIV infections among children by UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)   May 2012   The lead United Nations agency dealing with the global AIDS response has launched a campaign to help bring attention to the goal of ending new HIV infections among children by 2015 and ensure mothers living with HIV remain healthy.   According to UNAIDS, some 390,000 children become newly infected with HIV every year, and as many as 42,000 women living with HIV die from complications related to the virus and pregnancy.   The campaign ‘Believe it. Do it.’ is part of a global plan of action that was adopted last year at the UN High Level Meeting on AIDS, when world leaders committed to end new HIV infections among children by 2015.   The campaign has three main objectives in relation to the public’s engagement on the issue: to raise awareness about the facts about ending new HIV infections among children, to send a message about the issue and the actions people can take, and to develop public support for mothers through organizations working with families.   Make Every Day Mother"s Day. (Director, UNAIDS)   As excited as expectant parents are about bringing a child into the world, it can be an anxious time. So imagine the concern of soon-to-be parents when the mother is living with HIV. They know that without treatment, there is a one-in-three chance that their baby could be born with HIV.   This Mother"s Day, I am asking everyone to help bring future families more joy and less anxiety. There are three simple things we can all do to ensure babies everywhere can be born free from HIV. Together we can go from 390,000 children becoming infected with HIV each year to zero.   First, get the facts. We can dramatically reduce the risk of HIV transmission to a child to less than 5% if a pregnant woman living with HIV has access to antiretroviral drugs.   For a woman who is living with HIV, antiretroviral treatment reduces the risk of HIV infection to her partner and child at the same time.   In Africa they say, "It takes a village to grow a child." It also takes a village to give birth to an HIV-free child. Supporting parents, especially the mother, through pregnancy and breastfeeding, requires the support of an entire community -- providing services to ensure a safe birth, good nutritional status, access to medicines and other social services.   Right now, making sure pregnant women have access to HIV treatment is one of the most effective and cost-saving measures we have available in the overall AIDS response. Not only can we help ensure a baby is born HIV free, but in many cases we are also saving the life of the mother. About 42,000 pregnant women die each year from HIV and pregnancy related illnesses.   Second, get the message out. I was just in India with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visiting a prenatal clinic in Mumbai. While on this trip, and in my other travels, I spoke with families to learn about the challenges and obstacles for people who are trying to access life-saving treatment and prevention options. It is critical that we identify these obstacles and their solutions and share them far and wide.   Parents say that the most important goal for them is to give birth to a healthy child, whatever the cost may be. They are not asking for more than many take for granted -- basic health care. We have to meet their aspirations and create expectations everywhere that all children can be born free from HIV.   Countries like Botswana, Namibia, Swaziland and South Africa are on their way to eliminating HIV infections among children. In each of these high-burden countries, coverage of HIV services for pregnant women is above 80%.   But in countries such as Nigeria -- where nearly 70,000 babies are born with HIV each year -- we can do a lot more to make sure information and services reach families in need.   World leaders have committed to the Global Plan towards the elimination of new HIV infections among children by 2015 and keeping their mothers alive. By focusing on the 22 most affected countries, we can deploy our knowledge and resources for a maximum impact.   Finally, make every day Mother"s Day. All families need support, near and far. And help can come in many forms. For Charity, her biggest supporter is her husband. She was diagnosed with HIV a decade ago, and their son Jenai was born HIV-free four years ago.   Charity says that without the support of her husband Ibrahim, she would not have dreamed of having a baby. Ibrahim is HIV-negative and, unlike her previous suitors, he was supportive when Charity told him that she was living with HIV. He told her real love is not conditional, and that included her HIV status. The couple now share their story with others.   As a father and grandfather, I know of no greater joy than to hold a healthy and happy baby in your arms. Join UNAIDS as we support and celebrate families and work to ensure babies everywhere are born free from HIV.   * The International Food Policy Research Institute has recently released a new report, Social protection and cash transfers - To strengthen families affected by HIV and AIDS: http://www.ifpri.org/publication/social-protection-and-cash-transfers Visit the related web page
	Foreign aid works – it saves lives by Jeffrey Sachs Earth Institute   The critics of foreign aid are wrong. A growing flood of data shows that death rates in many poor countries are falling sharply, and that aid-supported programmes for healthcare delivery have played a key role. Aid works; it saves lives.   One of the newest studies, by Gabriel Demombynes and Sofia Trommlerova, shows that Kenya''s infant mortality (deaths under the age of one year) has plummeted in recent years, and attributes a significant part of the gain to the massive uptake of anti-malaria bed nets. These findings are consistent with an important study of malaria death rates by Chris Murray and others, which similarly found a significant and rapid decline in malaria-caused deaths after 2004 in sub-Saharan Africa resulting from aid-supported malaria-control measures.   Let''s turn back the clock a dozen years. In 2000, Africa was struggling with three major epidemics. Aids was killing more than 2 million people each year, and spreading rapidly. Malaria was surging, owing to the parasite''s growing resistance to the standard medicine at the time. Tuberculosis was also soaring, partly as a result of the Aids epidemic and partly because of the emergence of drug-resistant TB. In addition, hundreds of thousands of women were dying in childbirth each year, because they had no access to safe deliveries in a clinic or hospital, or to emergency help when needed.   These interconnected crises prompted action. The United Nations'' member states adopted the Millennium Development Goals in September 2000. Three of the eight MDGs – reductions in children''s deaths, maternal deaths, and epidemic diseases – focus directly on health.   Likewise, the World Health Organisation issued a major call to scale up development assistance for health. And African leaders, led by Nigeria''s president at the time, Olusegun Obasanjo, took on the challenge of battling the continent''s epidemics. Nigeria hosted two landmark summits, on malaria in 2000 and on Aids in 2001, which were a crucial spur to action.   At the second of these summits, then-UN secretary-general Kofi Annan called for the creation of the Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB, and Malaria. The Global Fund began operations in 2002, financing prevention, treatment, and care programmes for the three diseases. High-income countries also finally agreed to reduce the debt owed by heavily indebted poor countries, allowing them to spend more on healthcare and less on crippling payments to creditors.   The United States also took action, adopting two major programmes, one to fight Aids and the other to fight malaria. In 2005, the UN Millennium Project recommended specific ways to scale up primary healthcare in the poorest countries, with the high-income countries helping to cover the costs that the poorest could not pay by themselves. The UN general assembly backed many of the project''s recommendations, which were then implemented in numerous low-income countries.   Donor aid did start to rise sharply as a result of all of these efforts. In 1995, total aid for healthcare was around $7.9bn. This inadequate level then crept up slowly, to $10.5bn by 2000. By 2005, however, annual aid for health had jumped another $5.9bn, and by 2010, the total had grown by another $10.5bn, to reach $26.9bn for the year.   The expanded funding allowed major campaigns against Aids, TB, and malaria; a major scaling up of safe childbirth; and increased vaccine coverage, including the near-eradication of polio. Many innovative public health techniques were developed and adopted. With 1 billion people living in high-income countries, total aid in 2010 amounted to around $27 per person in the donor countries – a modest sum for them, but a life-saving one for the world''s poorest people.   The public health successes can be seen on many fronts. Around 12 million children under five years old died in 1990. By 2010, this number had declined to around 7.6 million – still far too high, but definitely an historic improvement. Malaria deaths in children in Africa were cut from a peak of around 1 million in 2004 to around 700,000 by 2010, and, worldwide, deaths of pregnant women declined by almost half between 1990 and 2010, from an estimated 543,000 to 287,000.   Another $10-15bn in annual aid (that is, roughly $10-15 more per person in the high-income world), bringing total aid to around $40bn a year, would enable still greater progress to be made in the coming years. The MDGs for health could be achieved even in many of the world''s poorest countries.   Unfortunately, at every step during the past decade – and still today – a chorus of aid sceptics has argued against the needed help. They have repeatedly claimed that aid does not work; that the funds will simply be wasted; that anti-malaria bed nets cannot be given to the poor, since the poor won''t use them; that the poor will not take anti-Aids medicines properly; and so on and so forth. Their attacks have been relentless (I''ve faced my share).   The opponents of aid are not merely wrong. Their vocal antagonism still threatens the funding that is needed to get the job done, to cut child and maternal deaths by enough to meet the MDGs by 2015 in the poorest countries, and to continue after that to ensure that all people everywhere finally have access to basic health services.   A decade of significant progress in health outcomes has proved the sceptics wrong. Aid for healthcare works – and works magnificently – to save and improve lives. Let us continue to support these life-saving programmes, which uphold the dignity and well-being of all people on the planet. Visit the related web page
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