EU health ministers and AIDS experts from across the EU met in Vilnius, Lithuania on 16-17 September 2004 for a conference entitled Europe and HIV/AIDS: New Challenges, New Opportunities. It was organised jointly by the Lithuanian government and the European Commission and followed up on the Ministerial Conference on HIV/AIDS of 23-24 February this year during the Irish Presidency of the EU (see related EPHA’s article).
The main outcome of the conference was the adoption of a Declaration on Measures to Strengthen Responses to HIV/AIDS in the European Union and in Neighbouring Countries, committing all participants to a coordinated continent-wide effort to fight the disease. A package of measures outlined in a Commission working paper of September 2004 has been endorsed as a key element of this effort.
The commitments approved include:
Development of coherent, comprehensive and properly funded national strategies for HIV/AIDS prevention
Involvement of civil society in reviewing the progress achieved by these strategies
Effective HIV/AIDS prevention measures such as promoting the use of condoms and harm reduction programmes for intravenous drug users
Ensuring universal access to affordable treatment
Combating social exclusion and discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS
Cooperation and coordination between the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, (UNAIDS) and the European Union in providing technical and financial support to governments and other partners
Cooperation in identifying best practice and gathering data
Research into more effective prevention and new treatments for HIV/AIDS
AIDS epidemic poses serious threat to Europe. According to an UN AIDS agency (UNAIDS) report, about 1.3 million people in parts of the EU and neighbouring countries are living with HIV, compared to just 160 thousand in 1995. More than 80 percent of them are under the age of 30. A number of the new Member States that joined on 1 May this year are amongst the worst affected countries.
The main driving force behind the epidemic in this region is injecting drug use. But in some countries, sexual transmission is becoming increasingly common, especially among injecting drug users and their partners.
The EU’s own analysis shows cause for concern about the growing number of HIV/AIDS infections in the 15-25 age group across the whole of the EU.
Agenda
Commissioner’s Telicka speech "HIV/AIDS: 20 years on - Have we really stopped caring?"
