Setback to global HIV response due to fund cuts

THE global response to HIV has suffered its most significant setback in decades, warns a new UNAIDS report released ahead of World AIDS Day 2025.

- KAVITA BAJELI-DATT @ New Delhi

The report 'Overcoming Disruption, Transforming the AIDS Response' details the farreaching consequences of international funding reductions and lack of global solidarity which sent shockwaves through low-and middle-income countries heavily affected by HIV.

Abrupt reductions in international HIV assistance in 2025 have deepened existing funding shortfalls, it highlighted.

A failure to reach the 2030 global HIV targets of the next Global AIDS Strategy could result in an additional 3.3 million new HIV infections between 2025 and 2030, the report stressed.

In January, the US which accounts for 75 % of all international funding to HIV halted all its funding to the fight against HIV/AIDS. "The funding crisis has exposed the fragility of the progress we fought so hard to achieve," said Win-