In a historic session, the U.N. Security Council met Jan. 3 to address the AIDS epidemic. In that session, U.S. Vice President Al Gore indicated that the United States would add $150 million to next year's budget to help combat AIDS and other infectious diseases in the poor- est -- mainly sub-Saharan African -- countries.
Although this is a worthwhile initiative, it still falls short of the funds needed to effectively combat the AIDS epidemic. Dr. Peter Piot, executive director of UNAIDS, a group of United Nations agencies which for years has been funding programs to combat AIDS, indicated that his program needs between $1 billion and $3 billion a year to combat AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa alone.
Since the HIV virus was identified in the early 1980s, approximately 50 million people worldwide have been infected with the virus, and 16.3 million people have died. According to U.N. figures, 13.7 million deaths have occurred in sub-Saharan Africa. Presently, more than 23 million people on the continent are infected.