NEWS RELEASE – Sept 19, 2006
For Immediate Release


Make Affordable Anti-Retroviral Treatment (ART) A Reality For All

  1. World Vision calls on the World Bank to build on gains made in treatment options for Low & Middle -Income Countries and support the vital role of civil society in response to the pandemic – Access to treatment of ART is critical and decreases the incidence of HIV. Children are the most vulnerable for treatments regardless of the child’s own HIV status - their risk of death is halved if the mother stays alive. Give people hope and means to live.
     
  2. Community Service Organizations (CSOs), Faith Based Organizations (FBOs) and the private sector are delivering in 40% - 80% of health care in low and middle-income countries. World Bank engagement of CSOs need to go beyond “consultation” to include involvement in policy formation and implementation with governments. This is an extension of the World Bank’s ongoing commitment to ‘social accountability’.
     
  3. World Vision’s representative at the CSO Forum, IMF/World Bank Meetings 2006, Dr Daniel Malleboyina, Regional HIV/AIDS Advisor, Asia Pacific, presented his recommendations and views this morning at the panel discussion on “HIV Treatment Access – Affordable Options for Low and Middle-Income Countries”.
     
  4. He added: “Its time the World Bank make good their commitment on social accountability by making CSOs true partners. CSOs work the ground and time has shown that we deliver results. Unless the World Bank is serious about engaging CSOs and impose pressure on local governments to make ART available to all, millions will continue to die and this will be a needless genocide of the 20th and 21st century.”

    Recommendations
  • Stop the needless deaths of parents. The World Bank and IMF need to endorse recommendations of CSO’s in the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) for 80% of adults in need of treatment to have access to appropriate anti-retroviral therapy by 2010.
     
  • Stop the needless deaths of children. The World Bank and the IMF need to support access to treatment for 80% of children in need of treatment by 2010. Efforts to provide mothers with a full range of prevention of mother to child transmission (pMTCT) treatment. Currently, less than 10% receive pMTCT treatment.
     
  • Improve the lives of orphans and people living with HIV with specific focus on allocation of at least 12% of global funding for HIV/AIDS to address the needs of children.
     
  • Promote government accountability to service delivery through mainstreaming HIV/AIDS treatment and prevention in to government budgetary processes.
     
  • Invest in measures to promote governance and anti-corruption strategies that reinforce citizen engagement in the health sectors.

For more information contact:
Dr Daniel J. Malleboyina
Regional HIV/AIDS Advisor - Asia Pacific
750c Chai Chee Road #03-08
Technopark @ Chai Chee
Singapore 469003
Tel: +65-6511-7145
Fax: +65-6243-0825

Email:daniel_malleboyina@wvi.org