The freeze on U.S. foreign aid ordered by President Donald Trump has effectively halted one of the world’s most successful responses to a disease. For two decades, the American people have paid for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR. It is credited with saving more than 26 million lives and is critical to HIV programs in Africa, the continent hardest hit by the disease. There, health officials, experts and people with HIV have defended it as highly effective and fear that services will be stripped under Trump’s funding review in a way that sets countries back decades, to a time when millions died or were orphaned. (AP video by Nqobile Ntshangase)
Trump’s aid freeze sends shock waves through Africa’s HIV programs
The freeze on U.S. foreign aid ordered by President Donald Trump has effectively halted one of the world’s most successful responses to a disease. For two decades, the American people have paid for the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR. It is credited with saving more than 26 million lives and is critical to HIV programs in Africa, the continent hardest hit by the disease. There, health officials, experts and people with HIV have defended it as highly effective and fear that services will be stripped under Trump’s funding review in a way that sets countries back decades, to a time when millions died or were orphaned. (AP video by Nqobile Ntshangase)