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Medela-Nigeria in commemoration of World AIDS Day 2025
The World AIDS Day is commemorated globally on December 1 every year. The theme for this year 2025 World AIDS Day, is “Take the rights path: My health, my right!”, which is to emphasize the right to health by addressing inequalities in the fight against AIDS. The day serves as an important opportunity to highlight the impact of reduced funding from international donors have had on the response to AIDS, while highlighting the resilience of countries and communities in stepping up to protect the gains made and drive the HIV response forward.
The year 2025, witnessed a historic funding crisis that is threatening to undo decades of progress in the fight against the global HIV epidemic. HIV prevention services especially in low- and middle-income countries that have for decades depended on international donor support has been severely disrupted. Community-led services, which is vital to reaching marginalized populations, have been largely deprioritized making HIV services inaccessible to poor and marginalized communities who cannot afford the cost of HIV treatment services which hitherto were provided through donor funded programmes.
Although in recent years, the global AIDS response in terms of treatment access, care and support including care for orphan and vulnerable children has been expanded, however, there is still much more that must be done to achieve the SDG target of ending AIDS by 2030. AIDS is not yet over and given today’s environment, there is need for a new transformative approach to mitigate risks and support the push to reach the expected targets by 2030.
Countries with high HIV burdens especially in LMICS, most of which are in sub-Saharan Africa must make radical priority shifts in designing home-grown, context-specific HIV programming and funding mechanisms including the adoption of social health insurance schemes for the poor and most affected segments of their society.
It should however be borne in mind that the global HIV response cannot rely on domestic resources alone especially for LMICs. The international community must come together to bridge the financing gap, and support financially weak countries to close the remaining gaps in HIV prevention and treatment services, as well remove legal and social barriers to treatment access, while empowering communities to lead the way forward.
Political leadership at national and international levels is paramount in advancing policies that address structural inequalities and protect vulnerable populations. Innovative and transformative solutions are needed to improve access to HIV services, by completely eliminating stigma and discrimination for all at risk of HIV, those living with HIV as well as those affected by it. There should be deliberate efforts at ensuring the protection of the rights for women, girls, and people with different sexual orientations who continue to face discrimination and disproportionate barriers in accessing healthcare.
In the face of this financial crisis in global HIV funding support by the international community, countries especially in LMICs, must be resilient in the push to stop new HIV infections through targeted investments in HIV preventive services especially among vulnerable and at-risk populations, while ramping up local research and development activities for the treatment of HIV.
This funding crisis is not the time to retreat or relapse to a state of hopelessness or haplessness. Countries in the Global South must act with urgency, unity, and unwavering commitment with the unshakable conviction that “Together, we can still end AIDS as a public health threat by 2030.”
We at NIFDEM/Medela-Nigeria join all global partners including local and International NGOs in commemorating this 2025 World AIDS Day, by calling for sustained political leadership, international cooperation, human-rights-centred approaches, and unflinching community resilience to end AIDS by 2030.
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