HIV infections could jump over six times if US support is dropped and not replaced, the UNAIDS chief said.
The number of new HIV infections could increase more than six times in the next several years if US funding for HIV and AIDS programmes is dropped, the head of the United Nations AIDS agency said on Monday.
The executive director of UNAIDS, Winnie Byanyima, told the Associated Press that millions of people could die and more resistant strains of the disease could emerge.
According to its latest estimates, 39.9 million people globally currently live with HIV, and there were 1.3 newly infected people in 2023.
New HIV infections have dropped by 60 per cent since their peak in 1995.
But since US President Donald Trump’s announcement his country would freeze all foreign assistance for 90 days, Byanyima said officials estimate that by 2029, there could be 8.7 million people newly infected with HIV.
She added there could be a tenfold jump in AIDS-related deaths – to 6.3 million – and an additional 3.4 million children made orphans.
“We will see a surge in this disease,” Byanyima said, speaking from Uganda.
“This will cost lives if the American government doesn’t change its mind and maintain its leadership,” she said, adding that it was not her place to criticise any government’s policy.
‘Panic, fear, and confusion’
Byanyima pleaded with the Trump administration not to abruptly cut off funding, which she said has resulted in “panic, fear and confusion” in many of the African countries hardest hit by AIDs.
In one Kenyan county, she said 550 HIV workers were immediately laid off, while thousands of others in Ethiopia were terminated, leaving health officials unable to track the epidemic.
“I have not yet heard of any European country committing to step in, but I know that they are listening and trying to see where they can come in because they care about rights, about humanity” – Winnie Byanyima, the UNAIDS Executive Director said.
She noted that the loss of US funding to HIV programmes in some countries was catastrophic, with external funding, mostly from the US, accounting for about 90 per cent of their programme.
Nearly $400 million (€384 million) goes to countries like Uganda, Mozambique and Tanzania, she said.
“We can work with (the Americans) on how to decrease their contribution if they wish to decrease it,” she said.
Byanyima described the American withdrawal from global HIV efforts as the second biggest crisis the field has ever faced – after the years-long delay it took for poor countries to get the lifesaving antiretrovirals long available in rich countries.
Byanyima said that so far, no other countries or donors have stepped up to fill the void that will be left by the loss of American aid but that she plans to visit numerous European capitals to speak with global leaders.
“People are going to die because lifesaving tools have been taken away from them,” she said.
“I have not yet heard of any European country committing to step in, but I know that they are listening and trying to see where they can come in because they care about rights, about humanity”.
