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Written Answers to Questions
Wednesday 7 December 2005
INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
HIV/AIDS
6. Mark Lazarowicz: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what actions his Department is taking towards delivery of the 2010 target for universal access to antiretroviral treatment for HIV and AIDS agreed by the G8 at Gleneagles and confirmed at the UN World Summit. [34888]
Mr. Thomas: Together with UNAIDS we will co-chair a Global Steering Committee on Scaling Up Towards Universal Access, the first meeting will be held in January 2006 to plan the steps to achieve universal access. The Committee will deliver this plan to the high level UN General Assembly Special Session in June 2006.
13. Michael Gove: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps he is taking to tackle HIV/AIDS in the developing world. [34896]
Mr. Thomas: Over the next three years the UK will spend at least £1.5 billion to implement the UK strategy Taking Action". This year, the UK has made AIDS a centrepiece of our G8 and EU presidencies, focusing on the importance of more and better aid for AIDS, maintaining HIV prevention momentum, and scaling up towards universal access to AIDS treatment by 2010.
As EU President the UK hosted a high-level meeting that launched the EU Statement on HIV Prevention for an AIDS Free Generation. The UK will co-chair with UNAIDS, the Global Steering Committee on scaling up towards universal access to enhance international action to meet the G8 and World summit agreement on AIDS.
Mr. Hancock: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development (1) what action his Department has taken to ensure delivery of the 2010 target for universal access to antiretroviral treatment for HIV and AIDS agreed by the G8 at Gleneagles and confirmed at the UN World summit; [33998]
(2) what steps his Department is taking to ensure delivery of the 2010 target for universal access to antiretroviral treatment for HIV and AIDS agreed by the G8 at Gleneagles and confirmed at the UN World summit. [33989]
Mr. Thomas: Gleneagles secured an important agreement
to develop and implement a package for HIV prevention, treatment and care, with the aim of as close as possible to universal access to treatment for all those who need it by 2010"'
Progress has been swift since Gleneagles. The universal access commitment was also agreed by members states at the Millennium summit in September. The UK convened a rapid follow-up meeting (2 September), bringing
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together members of the G8, developing countries, civil society, together with the Joint United Nations Programme for HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the World Health Organisation (WHO), the World Bank and UNICEF to start mapping out how to deliver against the commitment.
The 2 September meeting showed a strong, shared commitment to joint action and agreed that efforts must:
develop a package which balances treatment, prevention and care—a comprehensive response is essential to achieve the ambitious 2010 goal;
situate actions to achieve Universal Access in wider efforts to eradicate poverty, strengthening broader services, including health systems;
UNAIDS have been tasked with co-ordinating efforts and have now set up a Global Steering Committee (GSC), co-chaired by the UK and UNAIDS. The GSC will meet for the first time in Washington DC on 9/10 January 2006 and is expected to report to the High level UN General Assembly Special Session in mid 2006.
Adam Afriyie: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps he is taking to tackle HIV/AIDS in the developing world. [34820]
Mr. Thomas: The UK has made a strong commitment to tackling HIV and AIDS in the developing world. Globally we are the second largest bilateral funder of AIDS-related activities. Last year saw the publication of the UK's Strategy Taking Action: The UK's strategy for tackling HIV and AIDS in the developing world". This commits DFID to spending at least £1.5 billion over the next three years, to step up the international response to AIDS, including spending to at least £150 million to meet the needs of children affected by AIDS. This year, the UK has made AIDS a centrepiece of our G8 and EU presidencies, focusing on the importance of more and better aid for AIDS, maintaining HIV prevention momentum, and scaling up towards universal access to AIDS treatment by 2010, with the ultimate aim of achieving an AIDS-free generation.
We secured a landmark agreement at Gleneagles
to develop and implement a package for HIV prevention, treatment and care, with the aim of as close as possible to universal access to treatment for all those who need it by 2010."
Progress has been swift since Gleneagles. The universal access commitment was also agreed by member states at the Millennium summit in September. The UK convened a rapid follow-up, bringing together members of the G8, developing countries, civil society, together with the Joint United Nations Programme for HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the World Trade Organistaion (WHO), the World Bank and UNICEF to start mapping out how to deliver against the commitment.
UNAIDS have now set up a Global Steering Committee (GSC), co-chaired by the UK and UNAIDS. The GSC will meet for the first time on 9–10 January 2006 to discuss and prepare a plan of action to be considered at the high level UN General Assembly Special Session in June 2006.
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In September 2005, the UK hosted the third and final Replenishment conference for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, chaired by UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. The Secretary of State confirmed that the UK is doubling support for the global fund in 2006 and 2007 to £100 million in each of these two years. The UK's pledge amounted to 10 per cent. of the US $3.7 billion pledged to the global fund for the two-year period by international donor. The amount pledged by 29 donors represents more than half of the global fund's total resource needs for the two-year period.
The global fund conference also addressed the context within which the global fund operates. These discussions built on the 'Three Ones' principles and the UK co-hosted 'Making the Money Work' meeting, which had established a global task team (GTT) to improve AIDS co-ordination among multilateral and international donors. As a result of the GTT, the UK expects significant improvements in how the UN and international donors such as the global fund work together to support countries develop and lead effective responses to AIDS. To support this work, the UK doubled our contributions to UNAIDS for the next two years.
EU Ministers met in London on 30 November under the UK presidency, confirmed their commitment to increased prevention by issuing a statement on a vision for an AIDS free generation—the first pan-European pledge of its kind. The statement backs efforts to give people around the world better access to condoms and effective information. It advocates a comprehensive and evidence-based approach to HIV prevention including sexual and reproductive health information and services, harm reduction programmes for injecting drug users and reliable access to sexual reproductive health commodities.
For World AIDS day, the UK also published a cross-governmental briefing paper on harm reduction: Tackling drug use and HIV in the developing world". This confirms the UK Government's commitment to harm reduction as an important part of the overall HIV prevention strategy in countries with serious HIV epidemics among injecting drug users, as well as in countries without serious HIV epidemics where harm reduction interventions help maintain low prevalence rates.
As part of our commitment towards stepping up efforts on HIV prevention, DFID announced on World AIDS day (1 December) that it is giving an extra £20 million to the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, and £7.5 million to the International Programme on Microbicides. This re-affirms the UK's long-standing commitment to developing new prevention technologies, and brings our total investment in mircobicides to over £50 million.
G8 Commitments
7. Ms Diana R. Johnson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps his Department is taking to implement the development commitments made at the G8 summit; and if he will make a statement. [34889]
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Hilary Benn: The Government attach considerable importance to seeing that the Gleneagles commitments are fully implemented.
On Africa, we have already seen good progress on debt relief, tackling preventable diseases and HIV/AIDS, and promoting investment and infrastructure. But there is a great deal more still to do, so we are working closely with our G8 partners, other donors and African governments.
10. Albert Owen: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development how his Department intends to turn the commitments made at the G8 summit into action on development. [34893]
Hilary Benn: The Government attach considerable importance to seeing that the Gleneagles commitments are fully implemented.
On Africa, we have already seen good progress on debt relief, tackling preventable diseases and HIV/AIDS, and promoting investment and infrastructure. But there is a great deal more still to do, so we are working closely with our G8 partners, other donors and African governments.
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