Dr Peter Piot speaks on the signing of the global AIDS act

Statement of Dr Peter Piot, Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), on the signing by US President, George Bush, of the Global AIDS Act.

Statement of Dr Peter Piot, Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), on the signing by US President, George Bush, of the Global AIDS Act.

"UNAIDS is pleased to participate in today's ceremony for the signing of the global AIDS act. President Bush and the United States Congress have demonstrated critical leadership on HIV/AIDS through this legislation. The U.S. has recognized that AIDS is a significant threat to global development and stability, and is backing up that understanding with a commitment to substantial new resources.

Resources carefully spent on scientifically proven interventions can dramatically reduce the toll of HIV/AIDS, even where the epidemic is most severe. Today, HIV prevention efforts are working in hard-hit areas - including Cambodia, Uganda, the Dominican Republic and the capital cities of Ethiopia and Malawi. For the first time there is a concerted global effort to close the treatment gap that denies life-saving HIV medicines to 95% of the people living with AIDS around the world. The legislation signed today gives that effort a vital boost.

Still, while spending on HIV/AIDS in developing countries has doubled over the past three years, a major gap remains between the need and the resources available to address it. Even with the deployment of the projected new US funds, spending will still be barely one-half of what is required for a baseline level prevention and treatment response by 2005.

With today's bill signing, the world moves an important step closer to supporting a response that begins to match the magnitude of the challenge. But there is still a long way to go. AIDS will only be defeated when responsibility for addressing it is fully shared -- with every nation working to meet the financial and leadership challenges presented by this global epidemic."