AIDS in Africa: The Question of Money
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Which brings us back to HIV/AIDS. If there is no question that Africa faces a mammoth health crisis, and if there is no doubt that the capacity of African governments, churches, NGOs and society itself to respond to the crisis financially is limited – and there should be very little debate on either of those points – then the essential question has to do with the will of the rest of the world, including us as the wealthiest of all nations, to enter into partnership with Africa to confront the pandemic. And that requires money.
The success of the Global Fund is key to an effective HIV/AIDS response
The emphasis recently has been upon the Global AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Fund. Bilateral assistance is, of course, important, and interestingly USAID has indicated that it could absorb twice the HIV/AIDS funding that they currently receive – a significant point, as arguments have been raised rom time to time about capacity. No doubt we need to continue to advocate for expanded bilateral assistance. But the Global Fund is crucial for several reasons: First, it is a clear sign of global, and especially donor-nation, commitment to confront the pandemic in the Global South. Second, it offers opportunity for meaningful cooperation among nations, donor and recipient. And third, for the U.S., it reveals a willingness to engage in a multilateral approach, something this administration has generally been disinclined to do.
The debate about the Global Fund thus becomes significant tous. Its success will literally save lives. Its failure will reveal once again the lack of will by the world community – the U.S. very much included – to respond quickly and meaningfully to tragedies in Africa and the Global South.
As this is being written, the Global Fund’s Board of Advisers is meeting in Brussels, trying to move past the obstacles that have delayed the Fund’s functioning. Despite a deadline that the Fund was to begin operations by January 2002, it is now estimated that the first grants will not be allocated until the spring – a year after UN Secretary General Kofi Annan articulated his vision for the Fund.
What are the issues?
A few of the issues have been exasperatingly tedious, such as Japan and the European Union’s insistence that Brussels, not Geneva, be the location of the Fund’s offices. But most raise crucial issues, to which our faith-based understandings – especially of inclusiveness, of community, and of being heard – apply.
The first involves governance. The argument is that people living with AIDS, strong community-based NGOs, and key igious leadership need to be at the table. This ought not to be a government-to-government endeavor, certainly not government plus pharmaceutical industry. At all levels of the Global Fund’s structure, civil society needs to be substantially represented.
Second: transparency. Planning deliberations thus far have tended to be less than transparent, and the Bush administration is no exception to this characterization. If civil society participation is to have meaning, the process must be open.
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