EDITORIAL - Getting to zero

World AIDS Day is marked today with some good news: the United Nations reported that it is on track to achieve its global target of “getting to zero” – zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination against those afflicted with the disease, and zero AIDS-related deaths by 2015.

The trend, unfortunately, is the opposite in the Philippines. For many years, while our neighbors grappled with near-epidemic levels of HIV infections, the incidence in the Philippines was one of the lowest in the world. That might have led to complacency, while countries with a serious AIDS problem launched aggressive measures to stop the spread of the disease. At the same time, pharmaceutical companies rushed to develop increasingly effective treatments for the AIDS-causing human immunodeficiency virus.

Today, the UNAIDS is hailing the drop in new HIV infections in the past two years, with half of the reduction among newborn babies. The UNAIDS reported that 25 countries – 13 of them in sub-Saharan Africa – have cut new infections by over 50 percent. Since 2005, AIDS-related deaths dropped by 25 percent around the world, while the number of people getting life-saving treatments went up by 60 percent.

The Philippines, unfortunately, is one of just nine countries where the number of new HIV infections has increased by over 25 percent, and where there has been no reduction in AIDS-related deaths from 2005 to 2011. UNAIDS and the United Nations Children’s Fund reported that the Philippines is one of just three countries in the Asia-Pacific “that is now categorized as having an expanding epidemic” of HIV/AIDS.

Halting and reversing the spread of HIV by 2015 is one of the UN’s Millennium Development Goals. This MDG, however, is among the “least likely” to be attained by the Philippines, according to UNAIDS and UNICEF, “and current business models will not get the country to meet 2015 targets.”

The UNICEF is particularly concerned that a third of the new HIV cases in the Philippines are among people aged 15 to 24, with prevalence highest among males having sex with other males, sex workers, and people who inject drugs.

On the eve of World AIDS Day, UNAIDS executive director Michel Sidibé declared that “we have moved from despair to hope,” adding that the pace of progress is “unprecedented.” The Philippines is one of just a handful of countries that must do more to save lives.