“We can’t let people die,” says ZackieAchmat.
Activists from several organizations, including Change and Social Justice Moves, #UniteBehind, Triangle Project and People’s Legal Center, met Wednesday to discuss the looming health crisis as a result of the suspension of USAID funds. President Donald Trump’s decision to end all USAIDs to South Africa had a life-threatening effect on HIV programs across the country. Now, activists want the government to step up and pledge to strengthen funding to cover the gaps left by these programs.
Activists who had contributed to the fight over a free antiretrovirus for those who lived with HIV 20 years ago, are picking up the baton once again. This comes amid growing concern over the impact of reductions in pepfer funding on HIV programs across the country.
This follows US President Donald Trump’s decision to end all USAIDs in South Africa. The US President’s AIDS Relief Emergency Plan (PEPFAR) funded nearly 20% of the state’s HIV response.
“We won’t let people die,” said veteran HIV activist Zackie Achmat, a veteran HIV activist, in a meeting with several private organisations at Bertha House in Cape Town on Wednesday night to discuss the looming health crisis as a result of USAID funding cuts.
Discussing various strategies to address the funding shortage, Achmat said it is important for Cape Town and the state government to help the community get a suspended mobile clinic.
He called on Aspen Pharmacare, a leading manufacturer of ARVs in the country and other Africans, to lower its prices.
Achmat also raised concerns that the government has not allocated any particular funds to alleviate shortages in PEPFAR-related programs.
Organizations attending the meeting included change and social justice moves, #UniteBehind, the Triangle Project, People’s Legal Center and several other movements. MP Karl Lulu (DA), who is on the Parliament’s Health Portfolio Committee, also attended. He spoke to the crowd and said they were worried about the impact of funding cuts. He said he was attending the meeting “to listen, not to make an appointment.”
Reported earlier this month, Groundup has collapsed critical services targeting high-pressure areas, including services aimed at vulnerable groups, including sex workers, the LGBTQ community and drug injectors.
The cut has led to many HIV programs closing their doors. Professor Linda-Gail Bekker, an infectious disease scientist at UCT’s Desmond Tutu HIV Center, said about 39 organizations and around 150 implementation partners were affected by the cut. These included programs on treatment, care and HIV prevention, orphan care, and gender-based violence support.
“When we first started in 2000, when we first started receiving treatment, we had to hust everywhere for treatment,” Bekker said. She said when Pepfar came out in 2003, she funded 100% of the country’s HIV support.
She said recent cuts in funding are important for counseling, with the aim of finding the remaining 2 million people living in HIV who are still not receiving life-saving antiretroviral (ARV) treatment.
“We can reach the end of AIDS… we can do it in our lives. But we can’t do it without money without money without money without money, resources, and government will and political support,” Bekker said.
Bekker has also been praised for South Africa’s HIV treatment programme as the largest in the world, resulting in the world’s most preparatory (pre-exposure prevention) initiations. “There’s a real concern that if we don’t take this money straight away and get that money back, we’re going to retreat,” she said.
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There are also concerns about the impact of funding cuts on other African countries such as Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Malawi and Uganda.
Kasiefa Charles, a former employee of Ivan Toms Center for Health, explained how the clinic had to close free services, including HIV testing and counseling, preparation, providing ARV medications and other sexual health services.
Last month, Charles, who worked at Ivan Toms for more than a decade before resigning, said he also implemented a key outreach program with his teams who regularly travel to Delft, Mafeni, Danoon and Atlantis to test and treat HIV patients.
She said many of their regular clients preferred to come to Ivan Toms because they felt they were unsafe after being criticized in public clinics.
