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Letter: U.S. should support the Global Fund

FILE - In this Oct. 30, 2009 file photo, a mother holds her baby receiving a new malaria vaccine as part of a trial at the Walter Reed Project Research Center in Kombewa in Western Kenya. The World Health Organization said Tuesday April 23, 2019, that Malawi has become the first country to introduce a pilot program vaccinating children against malaria using the only licensed vaccine to protect against the mosquito-spread disease. Although the vaccine only protects about one third of children who are immunized, those who get the shot are likely to have less severe cases of malaria. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo, File)

By Heather Buchanan | The Public Forum
  | May 3, 2019, 6:50 p.m.

In 2002, the world came together to create the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. This international partnership has helped save 27 million lives since 2002.

Yet we cannot consider the issue solved. Growing drug resistance. Funding shortfalls. Wavering political resolve. These are all threats to the progress made.

Yet the Global Fund has a plan for keeping its life-saving work going, if only we will support it. The U.S. must rise to its responsibility in this.

I urge the administration to continue strong support for the Global Fund by recommitting to provide at least one-third of the total $14 billion that will be asked for in October by the Global Fund.

Science shows that we can end the epidemics of AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, but only if we maintain the political will to do so.

Heather Buchanan, Ogden

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By Heather Buchanan | The Public Forum