The General Assembly decided today to convene a high-level meeting from 8 to 10 June to take stock of global efforts to end the HIV/AIDS crisis by 2030, adopting a draft resolution to that effect after a lengthy debate on the situation in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine.
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HIV/AIDS
The Mission in South Sudan deployed a Nepalese Quick Reaction Force Team to Cueibet to support local police protecting civilians from a potential conflict between armed groups, following the killing of a young man. The peacekeepers intercepted the groups and remained in the area until the situation was stable.
A new United Nations Children’s Fund report shows that 320,000 children and young people under the age of 20 were infected with HIV in 2019 – about one every 100 seconds, bringing the total number of children living with HIV to 2.8 million. About half of children worldwide had access to life-saving treatment; nearly 100,000 children died of AIDS.
Following is UN Secretary‑General António Guterres’ message for World AIDS Day, observed on 1 December:
Without mitigation efforts, COVID-19-related service disruptions could result in more than 500,000 extra deaths from tuberculosis, HIV and other AIDS-related illnesses in sub-Saharan Africa from 2020 to 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Joint United Nations Programme against HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) said today.
Following is UN Secretary‑General António Guterres’ message for World AIDS Day, observed on 1 December:
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has appointed Winifred “Winnie” Karagwa Byanyima of Uganda as the next Executive Director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).
While the global fight to defeat AIDS has produced remarkable progress over the past decade — with HIV infections among children and deaths from related illnesses among people of all ages nearly cut in half — greater efforts are needed to overcome one of history’s greatest health crises, delegates told the General Assembly today as they registered mixed results in reversing negative trends.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres announced the appointment of Shannon Hader of the United States as Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director of Programme at the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).
Following are UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed’s remarks at the World AIDS Day high-level event on adolescent girls and young women, with the Global Fund and the Government of South Africa, in Johannesburg today: