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IAS GC concludes with call to G8 to honour their commitments to Universal Access by 2010 and fund the Global Fund

As its 6th Annual Governing Council Retreat drew to a close on 19 November in Vancouver, British Columbia, the International AIDS Society (IAS) called on Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and leaders of the other Group of Eight (G8) nations to fulfill their 2005 commitment to fully fund efforts to achieve universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support by 2010. The IAS letter to Prime Minister Harper is below.

Please click here to read the press statement.

Please click here to read the IAS backgrounder, Reaffirming the G8 Commitment to Universal Access: Gleneagles + Five.

Letter to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper

The Right Honourable Stephen Harper
Prime Minister of Canada
Office of the Prime Minister
80 Wellington Street
Ottawa
K1A 0A2

19 November 2009

Dear Prime Minister,

On behalf of the Conference Coordinating Committee we are honoured to extend a special invitation for you to participate in the XVIII International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2010) that will take place in Vienna, Austria from 18 to 23 July 2010.

As chair of the G8 summit that will be held in Muskoka in June 2010, we invite you to report back to the International AIDS Conference on the steps taken by the G8 and G20 to fulfill its commitments to achieve Universal Access to AIDS treatment by 2010 and to secure funding for The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. This will be a major feature of the conference and your leadership in this area is of substantial interest.

The International AIDS Conference is the largest international meeting on HIV, where every two years 25,000 participants representing all stakeholders in the global response to HIV meet to assess progress and identify future priorities. With more than 2,500 international journalists expected to attend, the conference is the single most widely covered health event in the world. AIDS 2010 is organized by the International AIDS Society in partnership with a number of international bodies and local partners, including UNAIDS and partners, ICW and GNP+, ICASO, World YWCA, Caribbean Vulnerable Communities Coalition, City of Vienna, AIDS Hilfe, Austrian AIDS Society and the European Union.

AIDS 2010 will coincide with the deadline that world leaders have set for the goal of providing universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, and care. Additionally, because Vienna is seen as a crossroads between Western and Eastern Europe, the conference will provide a unique opportunity to highlight the challenges facing the emerging epidemics in the region. According to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), an estimated 150,000 people in Eastern Europe and Central Asia were newly infected with HIV in 2007 bringing the number of people living with HIV (PLHIV) in the region to 1.6 million. The compares with 630,000 PLHIV in 2001, an increase of 150%. Worldwide, an estimated 33.2 million people are living with HIV and more than 2.1 million people died of AIDS in 2007.

As an international opinion leader and given your unique G8 responsibilities in this important year, we believe your participation will help profile the most important developments around the globe, and highlight the many challenges faced in the global response to this epidemic. At the last International AIDS Conference in Mexico City, speakers and contributors included Former President Bill Clinton, President Felipe Calderon, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and WHO Director-General Margaret Chan.

We hope to count on your participation and leadership at the XVIII International AIDS Conference. If you have any questions, we invite your office to contact Emily T. Blitz, Senior Manager Conference Programmes at . We look forward to working with you in Vienna.

Sincerely,

Julio Montaner
President, International AIDS Society
Co-chair, XVIII International AIDS Conference

Robin Gorna
Executive Director
International AIDS Society