AIDS Aid War

The leaders of the wealthy world weren't keen to launder much dirty linen in the famously clean waters of Evian last week. They talked about the global economy but not about the falling U.S. dollar; about advancing global free trade but not about cutting agricultural subsidies; about weapons of mass destruction but not — heaven forfend — about Iraq. There was one topic, however, on which Messrs. Berlusconi, Blair, Bush, Chirac, Chrétien, Koizumi, Putin and Schröder talked real money: combatting aids in Africa, where it kills some 6,500 people a day, most of them women and children.

It should have been the perfect topic for French President Jacques Chirac. As the host of this year's G-8, he invited leaders from the developing world to attend part of the summit, emphasizing his multipolar vision of the world. It was Chirac, two years ago at the violence-marred G-8 meeting in Genoa, who was among the most forceful instigators of the Global Fund to Fight aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria. For months he has been saying that a key objective of the Evian summit would be "to halt the spread of the major pandemics and especially of aids."

Then along came George W. Bush to upstage Chirac. Less than a week before his trip to Evian, the American President signed a bill authorizing $15 billion over five years to combat aids in 12 African and two Caribbean countries. As he wielded his pen, he vowed to "urge our European partners and Japan and Canada to join this great mission of rescue, to match their good intentions with real resources." The new law authorizes putting up to $1 billion a year of that $15 billion into the Global Fund — but only if others put in twice as much. Was this the laudable beginning of a virtuous circle that finally takes Africa's plight seriously? Or was it, as some aids activists argued, a grandstanding ploy that promises more than it is likely to deliver?

A little of both. Bob Geldof, the musician and co-founder of the Africa advocacy group DATA, accentuates the positive. "Whatever one thinks about what else this Administration is doing, and we all have our opinions, on aids in Africa they are transforming the agenda against all expectations," he says. "The President is to be congratulated on his boldness. But now Bush needs to ensure that the check gets signed." Thanks in part to Bush's challenge, other new pledges to the Geneva-based Global Fund through 2008 jumped by more that $1 billion last week alone: €300 million from France, €200 million from Italy, €340 million from the European Union and $80 million from the U.K. France will be pushing its European Union partners — particularly Germany, whose commitment has so far been vague — to come up with a solid $1 billion for the Global Fund by mid-July; to fully leverage the U.S. grant, foundations and other countries will have to pony up a further $1 billion.