AHF Questions Push For More AIDS Vaccine Funding While World Awaits
ARV Treatment

95% of Those in Need of Treatment Worldwide Still Lack Access to
Life-saving ARVs

LOS ANGELES, CA, January 26 2006¾AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF)
the largest US-based AIDS organization which operates free AIDS
treatment clinics in the US, Africa, Central America and Asia, today
challenged a public call at the World Economic Forum in Davos,
Switzerland, to double global funding for AIDS vaccine
development¾up to $1.2 billion annually from approximately $680
million¾while 95% of those living with HIV/AIDS worldwide currently
lack access to anti-retroviral AIDS drugs, a proven and increasingly
affordable life-saving treatment. Despite the more than half a
billion spent annually so far on vaccine research, no effective AIDS
vaccine has been developed to date, due in part to the complexity
and adaptability of the virus. Many experts believe it may be a
decade or more before any significant progress is made in this arena.


"Considering that ARV treatment is still beyond the reach of most
people with AIDS in the world, I seriously question the value of
increasing AIDS vaccine funding at a time when researchers have not
as yet produced any real results in vaccine development and no
significant breakthroughs appear to be on the horizon," said Michael
Weinstein, President of AIDS Healthcare Foundation. "We are trading
something we know works¾ARV treatment¾for something that most
experts do not believe will happen in the next 10 years. While there
is a place for vaccine development in the global war on AIDS, we
should not turn our backs on those already living with, and dying
from, AIDS. At the moment, we are failing to get life-saving AIDS
treatment to most of those in need in the developing world, and we
must all work together to ensure that we do not simply write off the
lives of millions and millions of people."

Of the more than 40 million people worldwide living with HIV/AIDS,
fewer than two million are on ARV treatment, most of which live in
developed countries.

Ged Kenslea
Communications Director
AIDS Healthcare Foundation
6255 Sunset Blvd., Suite 2100
Los Angeles CA 90028

+1.323.860.5225 direct
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