$55 B needed to reverse HIV/AIDS spread by 2015, says UNICEF

More than $55 billion will be needed to reverse the spread of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) by 2015, a report of the United Nations Children’s Funds (UNICEF) showed.

Citing an estimate of the Joint United Nations Program Against HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the UNICEF said $22 billion would be required in 2008 alone "to make progress toward Millennium Development Goal 6 (MDG 6)."

"UNAIDS notes that while recalculations will be necessary on an ongoing basis, there is currently a huge funding gap in available global resources," the UNICEF said in its "Children: The Missing Face of AIDS" report.

The UNICEF added that such a funding gap is "especially true" in the case of affected children because only a small proportion of them is currently receiving treatment and support services.

The global funding for AIDS was estimated at $6.1 billion in 2004.

According to the UNICEF, all countries "must act decisively" because "every minute we delay is a minute during which more young people will become infected and more children will die of AIDS-related illness."

The global body said every day, there are almost 1,800 new HIV cases in children under 15. Most of them acquired the infection while they were still in the wombs of their infected mothers.

Around 1,400 children under 15 also die of AIDS-related illnesses every day, while more than 6,000 young people aged 15 to 24 acquired the disease.

Outside of sub-Saharan Africa, South and East Asia account for the largest group of children under 15 who live with AIDS and who die from the disease.

The UNICEF maintained that the next generation should be kept protected from HIV/AIDS because they could "pass (the infection) from childhood through adolescence to adulthood."

"The needs of children are being overlooked when strategies on HIV prevention and treatment are drafted, policies made and budgets allocated. And investments in prevention continue to be pitifully inadequate," the UNICEF said.