Statement by Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS, on the occasion of Universal Health Coverage Day

12 December 2021
Winnie Byanyima
Executive Director of UNAIDS
Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations

As we commemorate Universal Health Coverage Day 2021, the world is entering year three of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has reminded us that no one is safe until everyone is safe. It shows how pandemics expose intersecting inequalities among people, countries and communities.

Universal health coverage means that all individuals and communities can access the health services they need without suffering financial hardship. But with at least half the world’s population lacking access to essential health services even before the COVID-19 pandemic, there is much work to do.

We must urgently focus on three things:

• First, addressing the inequalities that prevent us from achieving universal health coverage and from ending AIDS.
  • We need people-centred data systems that highlight inequalities and prioritize work to address them.
  • We must put human rights at the centre. The Political Declaration of the United Nations High-Level Meeting on Universal Health Coverage in 2019 called on countries to “reach the furthest behind first”.
• Second, strengthening support to community-based and community-led responses.
  • Four decades of the AIDS response have demonstrated that such support is a crucial pillar for effective pandemic responses.
  • Community engagement should be an integral part of health systems.
• Third, bolstering investment in health, sustainable and innovative financing, and ambitious thresholds for financial commitments.
  • The Abuja Declaration, signed by African governments, to spend 15% of revenues on health is such an example.
  • To achieve universal health coverage and pandemic control, we need a paradigm shift in global health financing and investments in community-led, human rights-based, people-centred and gender transformative responses.

On this Universal Health Coverage Day, I call for support and urgent action to ensure health and rights for all.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA, 10 December 2021—On International Human Rights Day, UNAIDS is calling for concrete action to prevent and respond to systemic human rights violations that create and exacerbate inequalities.

“We live in one of the most unequal times in history,” said the UNAIDS Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima. “What the HIV pandemic had already revealed, COVID-19 has again confirmed: crises and disasters are felt most strongly along the fault lines of society. Those who experience systemic discrimination and inequality are pushed further and further behind.”

Equality and non-discrimination are cornerstones of human rights. The Sustainable Development Goals made them a central element of the global development commitments that call on countries to reduce inequalities, including by removing the drivers of inequalities, such as discriminatory laws and policies.

Multiple and intersecting inequalities that drive the HIV epidemic are a result of human rights violations. Although new HIV infections globally have declined by more than 30% since 2010, progress has not been shared equally. In some countries, access to combination prevention tools such as pre-exposure prophylaxis and harm reduction services has resulted in progress among the most vulnerable groups of people, but in many others criminalization, marginalization, stigma and discrimination are leading to increased HIV incidence. However, during the past five years, countries that took a criminalizing approach to key populations (gay men and other men who have sex with men, sex workers, people who inject drugs, transgender people) made less progress in HIV testing and treatment. In 2020, 65% of new HIV infections were among these key populations, driven by harmful laws, policies and discriminatory social norms that punish, stigmatize and force underground key populations and fail to make available or accessible the prevention, treatment and harm reduction services that could so easily be used to stop HIV transmission and mortality. Six out of seven new HIV infections among adolescents aged 15–19 years in sub-Saharan Africa are among adolescent girls. This is in part because their right to education is not fulfilled on an equal basis with boys, their right to health is breached when comprehensive sexuality education is not provided and their right to bodily autonomy and security of the person is denied when states fail to address harmful gender norms.

In many contexts, international trade agreements conflict with human rights obligations by enforcing excessive intellectual property protections, creating artificial barriers for low- and middle-income countries to access affordable health products, impeding the production and distribution of generic medicines and hampering efforts to support the research and development of innovative health technologies that meet public health needs.  

This is a time of parallel and converging crises: multiple pandemics, climate change and continued economic shocks. In the past two years we have seen how profoundly systemic and structural inequalities deepen and widen during times of adversity. We cannot simply weather these crises—we must prevent them from happening. We will only succeed if we make the fundamental structural changes to create a more equal and stronger society, capable of meeting the challenges of today and tomorrow and leaving no one behind.  We must dismantle the structures that violate human rights and create and deepen inequalities.

We must strengthen access to health services by eliminating user fees and promoting policies to ensure that health technologies are considered global public goods, not commodities.

We must replace coercive and punitive approaches to emergencies, including to pandemics and to health and other pressing societal issues generally, with enabling, supportive and non-discriminatory solutions.

We must radically transform our concepts of gender to ensure substantive gender equality for all and enable people of all genders to flourish and participate in society on an equal basis.

And we must take action to ensure that the rights of women are girls in all their diversity are realized through concrete measures and investments, not just promises.

We can only succeed if we take as our foundation the fundamental principles of human rights, with communities leading from the front and at all stages of the process.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA/DURBAN, 6 December 2021—As the 21st International Conference on AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections in Africa (ICASA) opens in Durban, South Africa, UNAIDS is calling for urgent measures to be taken to reduce the inequalities fuelling the twin pandemics of HIV and COVID-19. The mainly virtual event is being held against the backdrop of increasing COVID-19 infections driven by the new omicron variant of the coronavirus identified by South African researchers last month.

“Progress in AIDS, which was already off track, is now under even greater strain as the COVID-19 crisis continues to rage, disrupting HIV prevention and treatment services, schooling, violence prevention programmes and more,” said UNAIDS Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima. “We cannot be forced to choose between ending the AIDS pandemic that is raging today and preparing for the pandemics of tomorrow. We need African-led solutions and visions of pandemic preparedness.”

The conference is taking place just a week after UNAIDS released its World AIDS Day report, Unequal, unprepared, under threat: why bold action against inequalities is needed to end AIDS, stop COVID-19 and prepare for future pandemics. The report warns that the world could face 7.7 million AIDS-related deaths in the next decade if leaders fail to tackle the inequalities that drive the HIV pandemic.

A total of 25.5 million people are living with HIV in Africa, accounting for two in three of the global number of people living with the virus. There has been good progress in delivering treatment to people who need it over the past decade, with 19.5 million Africans living with HIV now receiving medicines to keep them alive and well, up from 5 million in 2010. But new HIV infections remain too high, at 890 000 in 2020. Women and girls continue to be worst affected, accounting for 62% of all new HIV infections in 2020.

In sub-Saharan, 4200 adolescent girls and young women between 15 and 24 years old become infected with HIV every week. In 2020, key populations (sex workers and their clients, gay men and other men who have sex with men, people who inject drugs, transgender people) accounted for 39% of new HIV infections in sub-Saharan Africa.

However, some countries, particularly in eastern and southern Africa, are showing how sustained progress can be made against the HIV epidemic with the right mix of properly funded evidence-informed programmes that put human rights at the centre of the response. Eswatini, for example, has surpassed the 90–90–90 treatment target (90% of people living with HIV know their HIV status, of whom 90% are on antiretroviral treatment and of whom 90% are virally supressed) to achieve 95–95–95. In Eswatini, Lesotho and South Africa, a higher coverage of combination prevention options, including social and economic support for young women and high levels of treatment coverage and viral suppression for previously unreached populations, have reduced the incidence of new HIV infections among young women and girls. Botswana last week became the first country with a high-burden HIV epidemic to be certified as having brought the mother-to-child transmission of HIV rate to under 5%, provided antenatal care and antiretroviral treatment to more than 90% of pregnant women and achieved an HIV case rate of fewer than 500 per 100 000 live births.

The picture in western and central Africa is more complicated, with less progress being made to end mother-to-child transmission of HIV. In 2020, just 56% of pregnant and breastfeeding mothers were on HIV treatment to keep them alive and well and prevent their children from becoming infected with HIV, compared with 95% in eastern and southern Africa. Western and central Africa is home to 4.7 million people living with HIV—13% of those living with HIV globally—but experiences 21% of all AIDS-related deaths in the world.

UNAIDS and the Civil Society Institute for Health in West and Central Africa recently organized a three-day regional summit on HIV in Dakar, Senegal, which resulted in the Dakar Call to Action, which urges stronger support for community-led responses, policies driven by science and data, increased investment in the HIV response and putting HIV at the centre of pandemic preparedness and response.

In her opening address at ICASA, Ms Byanyima stressed that community-led and community- based services and civil society accountability are a key part of what has worked in the AIDS response. 

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA, 17 December 2021–UNAIDS welcomes the announcement from the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres of the appointment of Catherine Russell as the new Executive Director of UNICEF. Ms Russell will begin her new role in January 2022, taking over from Henrietta Fore who held the position since January 2018.

“We extend our heartfelt thanks to Henrietta Fore for her inspirational work on behalf of the world's children and warmly welcome Catherine Russell as UNICEF’s new Executive Director,” said Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS. “We look forward to working closely with Ms Russell in our fight to end inequalities and end AIDS among children.”

Despite medicine being available to prevent HIV infection among children, in 2020, around 150 000 children became newly infected with the virus, bringing the total number of children living with HIV around the world to 1.7 million. In 2020, while 74% of adults aged 15 years and older living with HIV had access to treatment, just 54% of children aged 0–14 years had access to the life-saving medicine.

UNICEF and UNAIDS work together to ensure all children are born free from HIV, and that all children and adolescents living with, and affected by HIV have access to the treatment, care and support they need to thrive.

GENEVA, 24 November 2021—UNAIDS welcomes the first licensing agreement under the World Health Organization (WHO) COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) initiative, negotiated between Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (Spain’s High Council of Scientific Research) and the Medicines Patent Pool.

The C-TAP initiative builds on a successful model to increase access to HIV, tuberculosis and hepatitis C products in low- and middle-income countries and has proved to be effective in overcoming some barriers to access to health technologies for COVID-19. However, the initiative has so far been underutilized, and pharmaceutical companies and other holders of COVID-19 technologies have been reluctant to join C-TAP.

“I welcome this new agreement, but urge other pharmaceutical companies and COVID-19 technology-holders to share their know-how,” said Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS. “Think of how many lives could be saved if COVID-19 vaccines, medicines and other technologies were available through this mechanism to everyone who needs them.”

The new licensing agreement shows that it is possible to share knowledge, technology and intellectual property rights in the fight against COVID-19.

The sharing of intellectual property rights, data and know-how should be a fundamental component of pandemic preparedness and response. UNAIDS encourages research institutes and holders of life-saving technologies, including vaccine manufacturers, to follow suit and join C-TAP and urges the governments of countries that host pharmaceutical companies to ensure that their technologies are offered to C-TAP as a matter of urgency.

The agreement contains key access provisions, such as the non-exclusive right to develop the licensed patents, know-how and material. There is no geographical limitation, so qualified companies worldwide will be able to develop the licences and commercialize the products derived from them. The terms of the agreement will be publicly available, ensuring transparency. The agreement includes a technology transfer package.

The agreement covers the licensing of a technology to detect antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, from either COVID-19 infection or a vaccine, and will allow the measurement of the effectiveness of vaccination programmes and help in the management of vaccination booster programmes. The tests derived from the technology are simple to use, which will allow their application in resource-limited settings, and companies based in low- and middle-income countries will not have to pay royalties for the technology’s use.

UNAIDS was a supporter of a call for action in May 2020, led by the Government of Costa Rica and WHO, which led to the setting up of C-TAP. UNAIDS is a member of the C-TAP Steering Committee.

UNAIDS thanks the Government of Spain for backing and facilitating the agreement and for its financial support of C-TAP.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

Dear friends, 

Greetings on this World AIDS Day, and my solidarity with all around the world as we confront the impact of colliding pandemics.

This year, the world agreed on a bold plan that, if leaders fulfil it, will end AIDS by 2030. That’s so exciting.

But today we, as the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, issue a stark warning. AIDS remains a pandemic, the red light is flashing and only by moving fast to end the inequalities that drive the pandemic can we overcome it.

Where leaders are acting boldly and together, bringing together cutting-edge science, delivering services that meet all people’s needs, protecting human rights and sustaining adequate financing, AIDS-related deaths and new HIV infections are becoming rare.

But this is only the case in some places and for some people.

Without the inequality-fighting approach we need to end AIDS, the world would also struggle to end the COVID-19 pandemic and would remain unprepared for the pandemics of the future. That would be profoundly dangerous for us all.

Progress in AIDS, which was already off track, is now under even greater strain as the COVID-19 crisis continues to rage, disrupting HIV prevention and treatment services, schooling, violence prevention programmes and more.

On our current trajectory, we aren’t bending the curve fast enough and risk an AIDS pandemic lasting decades. We have to move faster on a set of concrete actions agreed by United Nations Member States to address the inequalities that are driving HIV.

Through fighting the AIDS pandemic, we have learned a lot about what we need more of for AIDS and for all pandemics.

We urgently need sufficient community-led and community-based infrastructure as part of a strong public health system, underpinned by robust civil society accountability.

We need policies to ensure fair and affordable access to science.

Every new technology should reach each and everyone who needs it without delay.

We need to protect our health workers and expand their numbers to meet our urgent needs.

We must protect human rights and build trust in health systems.

It is these that will ensure we close the inequality gaps and end AIDS. But they are too often applied unevenly, are underfunded and are underappreciated.

I salute the front-line communities that have pioneered the approaches shown to be most effective, that have driven the momentum for change and that are pushing leaders to be bold. I urge you: keep pushing.

World leaders must work together urgently to tackle these challenges head-on. I urge you: be courageous in matching words with deeds.

There is not a choice to be made between ending the AIDS pandemic that is raging today and preparing for the pandemics of tomorrow. The only successful approach will achieve both. As of now, we are not on track to achieve either.

If we take on the inequalities that hold back progress, we can deliver on the promise to end AIDS by 2030. It is in our hands.

Every minute that passes, we are losing a precious life to AIDS. We don’t have time.

End inequalities. End AIDS. End pandemics.

Thank you.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

“Ending gender-based violence requires a whole-of-government, whole-of-society approach. But I am convinced that if decision-makers, at a minimum, push on these key actions, we will have a win–win for everyone: less violence against women and girls and fewer women and girls acquiring HIV or falling through the cracks in accessing and staying on antiretroviral therapy. We must revolutionize the ways of doing business in the AIDS response. Gender equality and women’s rights must be at the centre. There is no room for complacency or acceptance of gender-based violence if we are to end AIDS as a public health emergency by the 2030 deadline for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals,” said Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS.

One in three women and adolescent girls around the world endure physical and/or sexual violence from their husbands, male partners or strangers. This violence takes place in their homes and neighbourhoods, where they should be safest. And this staggering statistic doesn’t count the millions more women and girls facing a myriad of other forms of gender-based violence and harmful practices. Under COVID-19, reports of intimate partner violence, child and forced marriage, female genital mutilation and sexual violence have only increased.

For women and girls living with HIV, the risks of violence multiply, including from their intimate partners, families and communities or when they seek services. Among its many consequences and costs, gender-based violence undermines hard-won gains in preventing HIV and ending AIDS as a public health emergency.

In countries with high HIV prevalence, intimate partner violence can increase the chances of women acquiring HIV by up to 50%. Violence or the fear of it blocks women’s access to services and their ability to negotiate condom use with perpetrators, disclose their HIV status or stay on HIV treatment.  

Many women living with HIV also experience discrimination and sexual and reproductive rights violations in health facilities. Female sex workers, women who use drugs and bisexual and transgender people face exceptionally high risks of both HIV and gender-based violence and sexual assault, fuelled by HIV-related stigma, discrimination and criminalization.

Five key actions

In line with the United Nations General Assembly Political Declaration on HIV and AIDS: Ending Inequalities and Getting on Track to End AIDS by 2030, Ms Byanyima urges governments, United Nations agencies, donors, service providers and all stakeholders in the HIV response to immediately and systematically address the interlinkages of HIV and violence against women and girls, in all their diversity, including by:

1. Getting with the basics: at a minimum, countries should comply with international standards for health-service provision for women and girls living with or at higher risk of HIV, integrating prevention and response measures to gender-based violence across HIV services, including for women from key populations, and ensuring protection of sexual and reproductive health and rights.
2. Starting early on HIV and gender-based violence prevention: work with adolescent girls and boys to tackle harmful gender norms by investing in gender-transformative education and interventions, including comprehensive sexuality education, instilling values of respect for bodily autonomy, sexual consent, safe dating and use of condoms as the norm, and ensuring zero tolerance for gender-based violence and HIV stigma and discrimination in schools.
3. Going beyond engaging men to seek HIV services: leverage HIV programmes engaging men and boys to incorporate gender-transformative approaches that challenge harmful masculinities fuelling both HIV and violence against women and girls. Men and boys should be engaged in HIV testing and treatment uptake alongside efforts to ensure respect of women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights and their rights to be free of gender-based violence.
4. Ending impunity for violence against women and girls living with HIV: fast-track legal reforms and enforcement to uphold the human rights of all women to live free from violence, regardless of their HIV status or any other grounds, and end the overuse of criminal laws that target or disproportionately impact on women because of their sexuality, sexual activity, HIV status, gender or drug use. Expand legal and human rights literacy among women and girls living with or at risk of HIV so they know their rights and where to seek legal aid and access justice, and ensure that complaint and redress mechanisms for gender-based violence and reproductive rights violations are accessible across health and other services.
5. Investing in women’s leadership to turn the tide on both HIV and gender-based violence: institute mechanisms for the meaningful participation and leadership of women and girls living with and at risk of HIV, in all their diversity, in decision-making for responding to the twin pandemics of AIDS and violence against women and girls. Invest in feminist leadership and women-led HIV community-based interventions, and value their experiences and expertise as central to an effective HIV response.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA, 1 November 2021—On International Drug Users’ Day, UNAIDS is calling for urgent action against the criminalization of people who use drugs, for the redress of criminalization’s negative effects on HIV, viral hepatitis and other health issues, for the respect of human rights and for more funding for community-led harm reduction programmes.

“UNAIDS is committed to supporting countries in their journey towards the decriminalization of drug possession and to full-scale implementation of harm reduction programmes,” said UNAIDS Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima. “UNAIDS calls for the full involvement of communities of people who use drugs in achieving legal reform aimed at decriminalization and in the organization of harm reduction programmes at the country level. This will help us to end inequalities and end AIDS.”  

People who use and inject drugs are among the groups at highest risk of acquiring HIV but remain marginalized and often blocked from accessing health and social services. In 2020, 9% of all new HIV infections were among people who inject drugs. Outside of sub-Saharan Africa this rises to 20%. Although women represent less than 30% of the number of people who use drugs, women who use drugs are more likely to be living with HIV than their male counterparts.

Timely introduction and full-scale implementation of accessible harm reduction programmes can prevent HIV infections, as well as many cases of viral hepatitis B and C, tuberculosis and drug overdose. The United Nations system is united in promoting harm reduction services and decriminalization of personal possession of drugs, based on the evidence that harm reduction and decriminalization provide substantial public and personal health benefits and do not increase the number of people with drug dependency. Despite this position, reflected in the United Nations system common position supporting the implementation of the international drug control policy through effective inter-agency collaboration, in reality less than 1% of people who inject drugs live in countries with the United Nations-recommended levels of coverage of needles, syringes and opioid substitution therapy, and the funding gap for harm reduction in low- and middle-income countries sits at a dismal 95%.

Even where harm reduction services are available, they are not necessarily accessible. Punitive drug control laws, policies and law enforcement practices have been shown to be among the largest obstacles to health care in many countries. Criminalization of drug use and harsh punishments (such as incarceration, high fines or removal of children from their parents) discourage the uptake of HIV services, drive people underground and lead to unsafe injecting practices, and increase the risk of overdose. Women who use drugs face higher rates of conviction and incarceration than men who use drugs, contributing to the increased levels of stigma and discrimination they face in health-care settings. In effect, criminalization of drug use and possession for personal use significantly and negatively impact the realization of the right to health.

Earlier this year, United Nations Member States set bold global targets on decriminalization of drug possession for personal use and on elimination of stigma and discrimination against people who use drugs and other key populations. To reach these targets by 2025, strategic actions at the country level need to start today.

GLOBAL AIDS SOCIETAL ENABLER TARGETS 2025

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA, 28 October 2021—UNAIDS welcomes the agreement between the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) and the pharmaceutical company Merck Sharp & Dohme through which the intellectual property rights over an antiviral medicine to treat mild to moderate forms of COVID-19 in adult patients are shared with interested sub-licensees on a non-exclusive and transparent basis. The new medicine, molnupiravir, is still pending regulatory approval but has obtained optimal results in clinical trials.

“This agreement is a good first step, where public health has been prioritized over profits,” said the Executive Director of UNAIDS, Winnie Byanyima. “This new treatment promises to be a valuable addition in the response to COVID-19 and access to it will be considerably widened by allowing companies from around the world to produce more affordable versions of the medicine.”

This is the first licensing agreement on a COVID-19 tool to be established within a public health perspective. It is a significant development considering the lack of medicines to treat COVID-19. The initiative will allow the entry into market of more affordable generic versions of this medicine as soon as it is granted authorization from national and/or regional health regulatory bodies or included in the World Health Organization (WHO) list for emergency use.

According to the agreement, pharmaceutical companies based anywhere in the world that are interested and qualified to manufacture generic versions of the product will be allowed to commercialize the medicine in the 105 countries included in the geographic scope of the licensing agreement. Nevertheless, recognizing that COVID-19 knows no geographic boundaries, UNAIDS expects that all countries suffering the disease burden will have access to the generic market for this product. All health technologies should be considered global public goods.

This agreement includes all sub-Saharan countries, all low-income countries, the majority of lower-middle-income countries and 20 upper-middle-income countries.

Originally established to negotiate public health-oriented licensing agreements for HIV, tuberculosis and malaria products, the MPP has been an important player in the HIV response by promoting competition within the pharmaceutical market and helping to push down the prices of essential medicines. UNAIDS and MPP are both members of the steering committee of the WHO COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP), an initiative that calls for the voluntary sharing of technologies, knowledge, data and intellectual property rights of health products to prevent, diagnose and treat COVID-19.

“It is high time that similar arrangements are also made for making COVID-19 vaccines. What works for medicines should also work for vaccines and diagnostics and other life-saving technologies,” said Ms Byanyima. “I call on the Group of Twenty and other governments to ensure that patent holders are obliged to share life-saving tools and technologies equitably.”

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

GENEVA, 25 October 2021—UNAIDS welcomes the announcement by New Zealand that it has removed all travel restrictions for people living with HIV. The recent decision by Immigration New Zealand to remove HIV from the list of medical conditions deemed likely to impose significant costs or demands on New Zealand’s health services means that the blanket ban for people living with HIV to get a resident visa has officially been removed. 

“I commend New Zealand for taking this important step and hope that it will encourage other countries to remove all travel restrictions and other policies that discriminate against people living with HIV,” said UNAIDS Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima.

Legislation, policies and practices that prohibit the movement of people living with HIV are discriminatory and frequently limit their opportunity to travel, work and study abroad. UNAIDS advocates for the right to freedom of movement and non-discrimination to end the inequalities faced by people living with HIV. There is no evidence that restrictions on the entry, stay or residence of people living with HIV protect public health.

With the removal of New Zealand’s restrictions, UNAIDS counts 46 countries, territories and areas that continue to impose some form of restriction on the entry, stay and residence of people living with HIV based on their HIV status.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizations—UNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bank—and works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.