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New global AIDS strategy to end inequalities

17 July 2021

Caption: Dr. Mbulawa Mugabe, UNAIDS Country Director visit to Ward-40, War Room, PCB field visit - By Anesh Debiky

Photo: © UNAIDS South Africa

Drawing on lessons learned from the intersecting of HIV and Covid-19 the new Global AIDS Strategy 2021-2026 takes advantage of proven approaches to HIV response

The South African National AIDS Council and South African civil society have strongly supported the new Global AIDS Strategy 2021-2026 that was formally adopted by the Programme Coordinating Board of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

Stakeholders including major donors have also expressed support for the new strategy, which resulted from consultations worldwide including with people living with HIV and key populations including sex workers, people who inject drugs and gay and other men who have sex with men. The result is a bold new approach to use an inequalities lens to close the gaps that are preventing progress towards ending AIDS

Drawing on key lessons learned from the intersecting HIV and Covid-19 pandemics, the strategy takes advantage of the proven tools and approaches of the HIV response, identifying where, why and for whom the HIV response is not working.

UNAIDS South Africa Country Director Mbulawa Mugabe said the strategy was strongly relevant to South Africa and would support its world-leading response to ending AIDS. “South Africa faces many challenges including gender-based violence, poverty and access to services that directly impact on the risk of HIV infection and the support available to people living with HIV,” he said. “The new global strategy unites the interests of Government, civil society, academia, science, the private and faith sectors and more, and it encourages us to build back better with systems for health that are more resilient and also place people at the centre.”

Caption: UNAIDS South Africa Country Director, Dr. Mbulawa Mugabe

Photo: © UNAIDS South Africa

The South African National AIDS Council Civil Society Forum welcomed the formal adoption of the strategy and said it fully supported the new approach. “We asked our sectors in 2020 to make inputs to the new UNAIDS Global AIDS Strategy,” it said. “We all took time to make our views known and those views now form part of the strategy.”

The strategy was a key resource for the UN General Assembly High Level Meeting on HIV/AIDS, held in New York in early June, where Member States including South Africa were encouraged to commit to a new political declaration on ending the AIDS epidemic.

Global AIDS Strategy 2021-2026 – End Inequalities End AIDS, can be found here: https://www.unaids.org/en/Global-AIDS-Strategy-2021-2026