02/01/10

GLOBAL:  White House Proposes 9 Percent Increase in Global Health Funding

Under the Obama administration's proposed fiscal year 2011 budget, global health programs, including those for HIV/AIDS, would receive a 9 percent increase, from about $8.8 billion in FY2010 to $9.6 billion. About $7 billion would be allocated to the President's Emergency Fund for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Other health initiatives to get a boost include efforts to fight malaria and childhood mortality.

Some AIDS and health advocates say the sums requested are insufficient for the administration's stated goals, which include placing 1.6 million more HIV patients on antiretroviral drugs, with a target of more than 4 million by 2014. By that year, the administration aims to prevent more than 12 million HIV infections.

The proposed allocation for PEPFAR includes a slight increase for bilateral HIV/AIDS programs, from $5.54 billion in FY2010 to $5.74 billion FY2011. The request for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria declined from $1.05 billion in FY2010 to $1 billion in FY2011. Funds proposed for bilateral TB programs increased from $246 million last year to $251 million.

Other targets of the government's new global health initiative include reducing TB prevalence in partner countries by 50 percent, malaria by 50 percent, maternal mortality by 30 percent, and deaths in children under age five by 35 percent. In April, the administration will select up to 10 countries to receive additional funding for the initiative. A major focus will be integrating health efforts and partnering with the countries to help them improve their own health care systems.

"We are trying to integrate programs. There's a lot of stovepiping, as it's called," said a White House official. "There's the PEPFAR program separate from the malaria program separate from maternal and child health separate from neglected tropical diseases separate from water. That is quite duplicative and inefficient in all sorts of ways."

Source: Wall Street Journal:: Betsy McKay; Courtesy of the CDC National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention