WHO Urges For Redistribution Of Extra COVID-19 Funds To HIV Programs

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th July, 2020) The international cooperation around the coronavirus pandemic has been remarkable and countries should consider diverting some of the COVID-19 extra funding to other public health programs, especially those combating the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), WHO Director for Global HIV, Hepatitis and STI Programmes Meg Doherty said on Tuesday.�

"There has been an enormous amount of effort put into global solidarity around building momentum to address what is happening in countries," Doherty said at a WHO press conference, going on to commend the countries ad organizations that have volunteered to provide extra funding to counter-COVID-19 effort.

At the same time, the WHO official pointed out that there was "some shortfall" in the HIV funding.

"We are going to have to be very mindful that as we look to funding that is going into COVID-19 that it also is being used at country level to shore up the systems of HIV," Doherty said, adding that the WHO was "hopeful and mindful that at country level, the ministries of health and the ministries of finance will ensure that the extra funding that they do have for the pandemic are shared among the other programs and general health sector."

According to Doherty, countries have exercised remarkable flexibility in mobilizing resources to fight COVID-19. For example, in case of HIV, Doherty said they saw HIV-specific health care workers and programs repurposed to work on COVID-19, labs repurposed, and health care community and workers work dually on HIV and COVID-19. Yet the official pointed out that the slowdown of the global progress on HIV of the past several years may endure.

"Disruption of commodities and services for HIV comes at a very critical moment in the progress of the global response," Doherty said.

The official cited a recent report by UNAIDS to say that the decrease in the number of new HIV cases and related deaths in a year from 2018-2019 was very insignificant and that the WHO was far from reaching fully its 90-90-90 target. This formula is about making sure that by 2020, 90 percent of people with HIV know their status, 90 percent of diagnosed people receive sustained antiviral therapy and 90 percent of people receiving therapy experience viral suppression.

According to Doherty, progress is now stalling specifically in prevention and testing services, and certain populations are being left behind in terms of access to treatment.

The WHO official urged for keeping up these service amid the pandemic and beyond.