Introducing a new weapon in the global arsenal against AIDS, the United Nations and Brazil have joined forces to reinforce the technical capacity of developing countries to fight a pandemic that kills nearly 16,500 people worldwide every day.
The agreement provides for multilateral accords deals the joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the Brazilian Government and other developing countries and includes setting up an International Centre for Technical Cooperation on AIDS based in Brazil.
"The new initiative will give other countries the necessary tools to effectively fight AIDS, now that financing is greatly increasing," UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot said in the Brazilian capital Brasilia yesterday. "Making this money work is now a priority. We urgently need to identify new ways for countries to build technical capacity to tackle the epidemic, the largest human development crisis in history."
Dr. Piot, who met with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, paid tribute to the country's "unrivalled leadership and creativity" as "a model in tackling both HIV prevention and treatment head-on." He noted that 20 years into the pandemic "the linkages between poverty, hunger and AIDS are now more evident than ever."
The new centre will initially be funded by UNAIDS and the Brazilian Government. Additional resources will be raised through the private sector and international foundations.
In a related development, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, an initiative of Secretary-General Kofi Annan, unveiled its first communications campaign today in Paris, aimed at raising France's public awareness of the Fund as a global financing mechanism and winning the commitment of donors.
Over 40 magazines and newspapers have so far agreed to support the campaign, including daily newspapers, news magazines, women's publications, television magazines and leisure publications. Television will show 30-second spots and the cinemas a 50-second version.