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UN cuts Myanmar health funding

The UN Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria said Friday it has cut all its funding to fight the diseases in Myanmar because of government travel restrictions on aid workers.

"It is with tremendous regret that we pull out," spokesman Jon Liden told reporters. "It is not that we are letting them down, but the regime is making it impossible for us to work there."

Liden said the Global Fund's main partners in Myanmar were unable to carry out their work properly after the government put severe travel restrictions on aid workers last month.

"It is not an easy decision, but there was no other way," he said. "This is the end of us in this chapter."

Myanmar's military government says more than 300,000 of the country's 54 million people have HIV/AIDS, but health experts believe the actual figure is higher.

UNAIDS, the UN body coordinating the fight against the disease, estimates that more than 600,000 people in Myanmar, aged 15 to 49, are infected with HIV.

In June, a UN representative said that thousands of HIV/AIDS patients in military-ruled Myanmar lacked access to life-prolonging antiretroviral drugs because of a funding shortage.

The Global Fund had promised to spend more than US$98 million over the next five years to fight tuberculosis, malaria and HIV/AIDS in Myanmar. The organization was planning the treat 5,000 AIDS patients over the next two years, but has not yet started any treatment.

Of the total amount, US$54 million was allocated for the fight against HIV/AIDS, US$27 million for malaria and US$17 million for tuberculosis.

In the past, United Nations agencies with representatives in Myanmar -- mostly concerned with humanitarian aid -- have generally enjoyed good relations with the government.

But Myanmar's government has been becoming increasingly reluctant to cooperate with the United Nations Development Program, which administers the Global Fund's activities there, Liden said.

"We can no longer guarantee that the money is spent on activities that benefit the people," he said.

The Global Fund's decision to stop funding is not a result of increased pressure from donors, but was only due to "changes on the ground," Liden stressed.

But the fight against AIDS needs more resources, not less, said Ephraim Imaya of aid organization Care International UK.

"Having witnessed the devastating effects of HIV and AIDS in the communities where we work we find this very disappointing news," Imaya told The Associated Press.

The aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres said that the fund's pullout from Myanmar would not affect its own HIV/AIDS work there.
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