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UK Chancellor calls for $10 billion international plan to fight AIDS
Keith Alcorn, Friday, January 14, 2005
The UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown this week called for a global $10 billion financing plan for AIDS treatment and vaccine development

“Years from now people will ask about AIDS and Africa - how could the world have known and failed to act?” said Mr Brown, introducing his proposals during a visit to Tanzania on Wednesday.

Mr Brown wants to use a vehicle called the International Finance Facility to raise money for development goals, especially HIV and AIDS control. The IFF would issue bonds to investors to raise cash, and bond holders would be repaid after ten to fifteen years as a result of pledges made now by governments. The IFF is already supported by France, Italy, Sweden and other Scandanvian countries, but the US has yet to pledge support for the plan. However, Mr Brown said that the IFF could still move forward without unanimous G8 support.

In particular, the IFF will be used to secure long-term predictable cash for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. Mr Brown noted that the Fund needs $6.8 billion a year by 2010 to achieve treatment targets, and he committed to using the British presidency of the G8 to secure long-term support for the Fund.

The British government is due to host a G8 seminar with the Italian finance minister next month in London that will examine ways to push forward plans for a worldwide infrastructure for sharing and coordinating research in AIDS and then for encouraging the development of viable drugs, vaccines and other technologies such as microbicides, involving both the public and the private sectors.

Britain is calling for research spending on vaccines to be doubled, and Mr Brown told reporters that a doubling of investment could bring forward the delivery of a partially effective AIDS vaccine by three years, potentially saving up to 40 million lives and $90 billion in lost economic activity by 2035.

The British government also wants wealthy nations to join together in underwriting the purchase of AIDS vaccines for poor nations, in order to give potential vaccine developers a strong incentive to invest in research. Mr Brown wants the wealthy nations to pledge to purchase up to 300 million vaccine courses.

Click here for full text of Gordon Brown's speech.