PARIS―The progress in beating back the AIDS epidemic risks being eroded by a funding shortfall set to grow under Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to global health projects, experts and campaigners warned ahead of a major HIV conference. If adopted by Congress, the 2018 Trump budget could deprive some 830,000 people, mostly in Africa, from life-saving anti-AIDS drugs, according to calculations by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), a California-based health policy NGO. A Trump budget could lead to nearly 200,000 new HIV infections, according to the KFF. Last year, it contributed $4.9 billion (4.2 billion euros) to global HIV projects -- 7.5 times the amount provided by second-placed donor Britain. Trump’s proposed budget, submitted in May, would reduce this amount by about $1 billion, according to Health Global Access Project, an activist group which crunched the numbers.

Source: The Standard July 23, 2017 11:26 UTC