In light of a Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) report calling for sustained HIV/AIDS funding, VOA News writes: “Many AIDS-related groups and activists have been calling on U.S. President Barack Obama to fulfill his funding pledges made during the presidential campaign. But are they asking too much, considering the economic downturn?” Sharonann Lynch, an HIV policy advisor for MSF, said, “PEPFAR has the opportunity to save six million lives and it shouldn’t settle for three.”

According to VOA News, the Obama administration says it remains committed to PEPFAR and has asked for $6.6 billion to go to the program in FY2010. PEPFAR officials have noted “that the economic crisis does figure prominently in their funding decisions,” VOA News writes (De Capua, 11/5).

The Washington Post reports that in an August letter to American ambassadors, Global AIDS Coordinator Eric Goosby wrote, “The landscape around us is changing, with the need to balance a broad portfolio of global challenges at a time of financial crisis … As a result, we need to plan for the next stage of PEPFAR’s development in this context and cannot assume the dramatic funding growth of PEPFAR’s early years will be repeated.”

In May, Obama announced a $63 billion, six-year global health initiative “pledging to broaden the U.S. approach to global health by focusing on tropical diseases and other preventable illnesses, in addition to [HIV/]AIDS” (Brulliard, 11/6).