Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2008. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - January 27, 2008
Claire Keeton
The US will provide R4.3-billion to South Africa in 2008 to support its HIV/Aids programmes, Mark Dybul, the US global Aids co-ordinator, said in Pretoria on Friday.
National Treasury spokes man Thoraya Pandy said on Friday that the government had budgeted R4.6-billion for the current financial year.
This is set to increase to R5.3- billion for the next financial year. The US funding for 2008 represents an increase of R1.4- billion compared with last year, when it donated about R2.9-billion to its South African HIV/Aids partners.
The money is authorised through Pepfar, the US President's Emergency Plan for Aids Relief.
Only about 50000 people were on life-saving antiretroviral treatment in sub-Saharan Africa when Pepfar was announced in 2004, but now it supports treatment for an estimated two million people.
Pepfar money benefits 15 focus countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.
In South Africa, Pepfar works with more than 600 partners on prevention, treatment and care programmes, according to Eric Bost, the US ambassador.
Most partners are local organisations, but Pepfar also works with several government departments.
The funding will keep flowing even if a new administration is elected in the US. In May 2007, the US Congress, where the plan has bipartisan support, re- authorised it for five more years and committed itself to providing an additional 30-billion.
Dybul said: "It was because of that commitment that the G8 countries committed (themselves to providing) 60-billion."
Both ambassadors said the plan was close to President George W Bush's heart.
"I have heard this from his mouth," said Bost.
Dybul said the total US government support in South Africa for HIV/Aids programmes since 2004 would be more than R10-billion with the latest grant.
"Pepfar is the largest health initiative in history for any single disease," said Dybul.
He said South Africa's HIV and Aids and STI Strategic Plan was "a model for the rest of the world in many ways".
Targets in the national plan include halving the number of new infections by 2011, reducing mother-to-child transmission of HIV to less than 5% and providing treatment to 80% of all people diagnosed with HIV.
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