World AIDS Day

I haven't posted anything on World AIDS Day yet. One year ago was my last day at the Motherwell clinic and to this day, I'm torn over whether the battle against HIV/AIDS is one of hope or one of promises yet unmet. It's tough to see that the rash of articles this year focuses on the failure of goals to be met and the rising tolls of infection and death, even in the wake of the G8 summit this past summer. The 3 x 5 goal will not be met. The goal was to place 3 million on antiretroviral therapy by the end of 2005, but less than 1/3 of that goal will be met. That the new G8 goals is to place all infected individuals on ARVs by the year 2010 thus seems optimistic to the point of being overly naive.

In a BBC articlet:

South African Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, who has long been lukewarm over the usefulness of anti-retroviral drugs, refused to back their use.

Many African countries encourage abstinence to avoid infection

In an interview, she said that anti-retrovirals offered no cure, and that she might use food supplements or traditional medicines if she became infected.

One asks (or at least, I ask myself this all-too-frequently), what can be done? On a policy level, certainly dialogue and discourse between the UN, nations, those who implement such policies, and those who receive the benefits/drawbacks of such policies must be examined.

What is perhaps equally important (and just as naively understood) is the active support of the wider first-world community. Kar just wrote about generosity of individuals. However, the wider generosity of individuals (Gates Foundation) vs. nations (US PEPFAR) must play a role as well. The movie "The Girl in the Cafe" was actually commissioned to "celebrate Africa in 2005." It's actually written by Richard Curtis, the same person who did Love Actually, so fans of that movie might celebrate.

Behavior change comes at the level of the individual, but the motivations to push initiatives forward have to come from a larger audience more than once a year.