“Spending on the global fight against AIDS fell significantly in 2010 for the first time since the U.S. and other governments began making major donations,” according to an annual funding analysis released Monday by the Kaiser Family Foundation and UNAIDS, the Wall Street Journal reports. “All told, governments donated about $6.9 billion in 2010, down 9.7 percent from about $7.6 billion in the prior year, the report said,” the newspaper writes (McKay, 8/16).

According to the report, of the 15 governments surveyed, seven – Australia, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United States – reported a decrease in funding as measured in their own currency, according to a KFF/UNAIDS press release. “The decrease was due to a combination of three main factors: actual reductions in development assistance, currency exchange fluctuations, and a slowdown in the pace of U.S. disbursements, which was not a budget cut,” according to the release (8/15).   

“It is unclear whether last year’s drop signals a trend of big cuts. But it comes as scientists face a painful reality: AIDS budgets are flagging just as new methods to prevent HIV infection have been identified, handing public-health leaders their first real chance to curb the decades-old epidemic – if they can secure the funds needed to implement the measures,” the Wall Street Journal writes (8/16). “UNAIDS estimates that an investment of at least $22 billion will be needed by 2015” to reach universal access goals towards HIV prevention, treatment, care and support, according to the press release (8/15).