{"id":12761,"date":"2025-07-21T11:09:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-21T11:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/12761\/"},"modified":"2025-07-21T11:09:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T11:09:12","slug":"canada-must-renew-support-to-fight-aids-tb-abroad-advocates-urge-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/12761\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada must renew support to fight AIDS, TB abroad, advocates urge – National"},"content":{"rendered":"

AIDS activists are urging the federal government to quickly renew Canada\u2019s support for fighting infectious diseases<\/a> abroad, warning delays will further hinder global efforts to combat key illnesses.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhile some of the other nations around the world are retreating right now from investing in global health, Canada can and should be stepping forward swiftly, to save lives,\u201d said Justin McAuley, a director with the Canadian branch of the ONE Campaign.<\/p>\n

His group is among 24 Canadian civil society organizations that asked the government to allocate $1.37 billion over three years for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS<\/a>, tuberculosis<\/a> and malaria.<\/p>\n

The fund is affiliated with the United Nations, and it supports developing countries in limiting and treating the three preventable illnesses, which in many regions are among the leading causes of death.<\/p>\n

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Canada is one of the world\u2019s top supporters of the fund, which makes up the largest chunk of Ottawa\u2019s global health spending. Canada has contributed nearly $5 billion to the Global Fund since 2002, and the fund estimates it has saved 65 million lives in that time.<\/p>\n

Countries replenish the fund every three years, with their contributions usually rising over time as health-care systems build more capacity to treat and prevent these diseases.<\/p>\n

In each cycle, civil society groups issue what they call a fair-share metric to reflect how much each wealthy country can reasonably pledge to help the fund reach its goals.<\/p>\n

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The office of Randeep Sarai, secretary of state for international development, referred questions about the $1.37 billion request to Global Affairs Canada.<\/p>\n

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\u201cCanada looks forward to working together as part of the Global Fund partnership to secure a successful eighth replenishment of the fund this year,\u201d the department wrote in a statement. \u201cDiscussions regarding Canada\u2019s pledge are ongoing.\u201d<\/p>\n

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McAuley said he hopes Ottawa announces its pledge soon, to build momentum for other countries to follow suit.<\/p>\n

\u201cCanada has a unique role and legacy to play in the global health space,\u201d he said. \u201cOur momentum will mean something on the world stage \u2014 if we come out early, and don\u2019t wait for the last minute.\u201d<\/p>\n

Results Canada, another group asking Ottawa to meet the civil society target, noted the G7 summit that Canada hosted in Alberta \u201cfocused on trade, conflict and climate \u2014 but overlooked two of the most powerful tools for global stability: health and education.\u201d<\/p>\n

That has put the legacy of the Global Fund \u201cunder threat,\u201d the group argued in an email campaign. \u201cAs countries cut international assistance, decades of hard-won gains hang in the balance.\u201d<\/p>\n

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UNAIDS reported on July 10 that HIV infections and deaths continue to drop, but sudden cuts by the United States and others \u201cthreaten to reverse years of progress in the response to HIV.\u201d<\/p>\n

U.S. Republicans recently reversed plans to cut PEPFAR, the world\u2019s largest HIV program, but Washington is still on track to slash its contribution to the Global Fund.<\/p>\n

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Countries normally make pledges at an organized conference, such as the last cycle when prime minister Justin Trudeau visited the United Nations in New York in 2022.<\/p>\n

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This year, there is no pledging conference, though McAuley expects leaders of large economies to make pledges before visiting South Africa for the G20 summit in November.<\/p>\n

He said global health is already under pressure from armed conflicts, climate-related events and the ongoing recovery of health systems from cutbacks during the COVID-19 pandemic. Rich countries are cutting back on foreign aid as they increase military spending.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Mark Carney promised in last spring\u2019s election to not cut foreign aid spending or development financing, though this was before he launched a review of government spending and committed to large amounts of military-related spending.<\/p>\n

McAuley said Carney ought to meet the metric outlined by civil society, or he\u2019ll be offside with his two last predecessors.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth Harper and Trudeau repeatedly stepped up and did Canada\u2019s fair share,\u201d he said. \u201cIs Carney going to break that pattern now and step back?\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t&copy 2025 The Canadian Press\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AIDS activists are urging the federal government to quickly renew Canada\u2019s support for fighting infectious diseases abroad, warning…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12762,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[12008,49,48,84,1842,2659,44,12009,3275],"class_list":["post-12761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-aids","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-hiv","tag-mark-carney","tag-news","tag-tuberculosis","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12761\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}