The world’s largest meeting on HIV/AIDS opened yesterday in the US capital with calls to speed up the global response to the three-decade-long epidemic that killed 1.5 million people last year.
The 19th International AIDS Conference is expected to draw 25,000 people, including politicians, scientists and activists, as well as some of the estimated 34 million people living with HIV, who will tell their stories.
Among them is the only man who has achieved a functional cure of HIV though a bone marrow transplant, US citizen Timothy Brown, who is scheduled to appeal for a fresh push toward a cure during the six-day conference that runs through Friday.
Photo: AFP
Other high-profile appearances will include US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former US president Bill Clinton, former US first lady Laura Bush, singer Elton John, philanthropist Bill Gates and actress Whoopi Goldberg.
US President Barack Obama has faced some criticism for his decision not to attend in person. He is sending a video message and will invite some attendees to the White House for talks on Thursday, a top health official said.
Held every two years, the conference — whose theme this year is “Turning the Tide” — is returning to the US for the first time since 1990, after being kept away by laws that barred people with HIV from traveling to the country.
The US ban was formally lifted in 2009, and researchers have described fresh optimism in the fight against AIDS on several fronts.
Deaths and infections are down in the parts of the world most ravaged by the disease, while the number of people on treatment has risen 20 percent from 2010 to last year, reaching 8 million people in needy countries.
However, this is only about half the people who should be on treatment worldwide, signaling that much more remains to be done.
More than 34 million people worldwide are living with HIV, a higher number than ever before, and about 30 million have died from AIDS-related causes since the disease first emerged in the 1980s, according to UNAIDS.
Advances in antiretroviral medication have transformed the disease from a death sentence into a manageable condition for many sufferers, and may offer new paths toward prevention according to recent research.
However, there is a major gap in the US between the number of people diagnosed and the number with their viral load under control through medication, a phenomenon known as the “treatment cascade.”
Even though 80 percent of people with HIV in the US are aware of their status, just 28 percent have the disease under control.
The hunt for a cure, which has eluded scientists, will be another hot topic. HIV co-discoverer and Nobel laureate Francoise Barre-Sinoussi announced on Thursday a new roadmap for scientists in research toward a cure.
And Brown, also known as the “Berlin patient,” will address the conference tomorrow to publicize new efforts in this direction.
Funding is at a critical juncture, with many nations boosting their domestic spending on the disease while international donations remain flat.
Total worldwide investment in HIV was US$16.8 billion last year, an 11 percent rise from 2010, but still far short of the US$22 billion to US$24 billion needed by 2015, according to a UNAIDS report released on Wednesday.
Doctors Without Borders has called for doubling the pace of treatment and doubling funds to reach all those who need treatment.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese